Heart’s Ablaze
Michiel Peeters - Dear friends, happy Easter! Christ has risen! Last night, we celebrated that Christ’s death did not undo Mystery’s plan for us, but marked the beginning of a new way of His being present among us, as light in the night of this world.
Today, in the Gospel read in the afternoon of Easter Sunday, we see how Christ’s luminous, abiding presence among us works and how we can recognize it.
It is clear from the story of the Emmaus disciples that the Lord’s presence after the resurrection takes a different “form” than before. So much so that the disciples do not recognize him at first, they are locked in their thinking, in their tragic interpretation of the events (that their reading of events is incomplete, not accurate, is evidenced by the fact that they are downcast, not feeling free; for a proper judgment is always liberating). In their limited perception, Jesus of Nazareth had given them hope, and then he was eliminated as a random disturber of the order.
What is that unknown companion doing? He makes them take a closer look at everything that happened. And while doing so, he stirs up their hearts: “Were not our hearts burning within us while he spoke to us on the way and opened the Scriptures to us?”
That is the hallmark of the presence of the risen Christ, of the event of the risen Christ in our lives: that he makes our hearts burn again, that he makes us with that resurrected heart look at everything, at events, at ourselves, at our history, in a new, more appreciative way; and that is an experience of liberation.
Our question awakens in the presence of the answer. We can recognize the presence of the answer because our questions are awakened!
His presence is also evidenced by the disciples finding strength to act again: “So they set out at once and returned to Jerusalem.”
“With that, their eyes were opened and they recognized him, but he vanished from their sight.” Christ—no longer hindered by time and space—happens where he happens. He remains present in history, but as event, not as something we can control or put in our pockets.
We can, however, look out for him and ask him to happen again: “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over.”
We can also identify places and faces so imbued with His risen presence that we can more easily recognize Him there. For example, He promised that where two or three are gathered in His Name—conscious of His risen presence—He is in their midst. Yet even there, He must “happen,” by awakening my heart.
Never deprive us of your risen presence, O Lord. “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over.” Permit us to realize this presence of Yours. Let our hearts burn within us while you speak to us, wherever and in whatever way you want!
20250420 Easter Sunday (Luke 24:13–35)
(Homily by Fr Michiel Peeters, Tilburg University Chaplaincy)
