For two years, Malta waited to show its “unusual kindness” to Pope Francis, while as Church we waited to celebrate the Easter mysteries. The wait was long because of the darkness of the pandemic. But ill-health is not merely of the body, nor is “kindness” just aid to migrants or the exploited. Darkness and light mark the soul and are evoked in our presence and works that reflect the condition of our spirits.
Spiritual ill-health – pride, envy, wrath, lust for power and pleasure, avarice, indifference and fear – breeds hatred and destruction, cruelty and despair. We are living under the shadow of a “sacrilegious war” as contagion tears brothers and sisters apart, bringing forth untold misery and death.
But in these dark times, Peter, guardian of the memory of the light of Christ’s resurrection, chose to visit the “luminous land” where Paul first proclaimed the Gospel to the peripheries. On the Wednesday audience after his apostolic journey to “confirm that people in the faith and in communion”, he observed that evangelisation remains “in the DNA of the Maltese”. What does this mean for the Church in Malta?
Pope Francis elucidated this light of the Gospel in his homily at Floriana on the pericope of the woman caught in adultery: “Forgiveness changed that woman’s life. (God’s) mercy and (human) misery embraced. Mercy and misery met there, and the woman’s life changed. …The Lord also wants us, his disciples, his Church, likewise forgiven by him, to become tireless witnesses of reconciliation.”
A few days later, as churches were filled with the light of Easter, fonts blessed to echo baptismal vows, and the newly baptised were anointed with perfumed chrism, Archbishop Scicluna elaborated on witnessing reconciliation. The challenge of Easter is to let go of the corpse – of all that is corrupt and corruptible – so the fragrance of the Risen Christ can mark our relationships.
The challenge of Easter is to let go of the corpse – of all that is corrupt and corruptible – so the fragrance of the Risen Christ can mark our relationships
As Church in Malta, our “unusual kindness” must stretch beyond so we are conformed to him who is truly alive, even while still carrying the wounds of the cross. As “body of Christ” we must receive and give the Father’s mercy, that always seeks and embraces human misery, transforming it to joy. Through presence, compassion and forgiveness, mercy heals in body and soul, reconciling in friendship that gives life in abundance.
If our Easter light is to not be hidden under bushel baskets, Pope Francis’s speech at the Grandmaster’s Palace offers a tall order for creative reconciliation. Through owning our long tradition as people of God and the Maltese story of encounter of cultures, we are challenged to become the beating heart of the Mediterranean.
As fear and indifference blow from the north, despair from the south, consumerism from the west and war from the east, darkness can be suffused by light. In Pope Francis’s words: “Malta in its entirety is a peace laboratory”: can our “luminous land” open spaces for dialogue among peoples, encourage solidarity and conflict resolution that build fraternity, and most crucially, be a sign of forgiveness that heals people’s hearts?
As Paul brought Christ’s healing to our shores and Peter confirmed the luminous light of the Gospel within us, may we embrace our responsibility to be a sweet fragrance and safe haven that promotes peace and reconciliation.
nadia.delicata@maltadiocese.org