The Spiritual Resurrection of the Sinner

 

Jesus said, “Young man, I say to thee, arise!” And he that was dead sat up, and began to speak. And He gave him to his mother. —Gospel: St. Luke 7:14-16         Jesus encounters a funeral procession in Naim. A young man is being buried, the only son of a widow. A numerous crowd is accompanying this weeping woman to the place of burial of her child.      As St. Ambrose explains, this woman is the image of the Church who weeps for all the souls that live far from God. But the Church does not content herself with weeping. She constantly addresses ardent supplications to Heaven for the unfaithful Christians who, by indifference, by pride or by the draw of the passions, are walking the path to perdition and are going from the spiritual death of their soul toward eternal death.      The crowd which accompanies this woman represents the whole of the faithful who share in the prayers of the Church. These ardent prayers touch the heart of Jesus. He says to the woman of Naim, “Weep not.” Then He says to the young man, “I say to thee, arise!” And he that was dead sat up, and began to speak. And He gave him to his mother.      Today, Jesus very often renews this miracle of the resurrection of the child of the Gospel. As St. Augustine emphasizes, just as “this mother is full of joy at the resurrection of her child, likewise the Church, our mother, rejoices at the men who rise again spiritually every day in her bosom.”      O Jesus, I want to unite my prayer and my sacrifices to Thine own, so that all those who need to rise again to true life might hear Thy voice. May they arise to obtain resurrection through the sacrament of penance! Then I will be able to cry out, in turn, with the inhabitants of Naim, “God hath visited His people!” (Lk. 7:16). Source: https://angeluspress.org/products/toward-easter