(CC Joyseph)

Friday in the Octave of Easter
Reaction to Absence

Readings: Acts 4:1-12; Psalm 118:1-2 and 4, 22-24, 25-27a; John 21:1-14

How do you usually feel when something or someone goes missing? Which proverb describes your experience more accurately? Does absence make the heart grow fonder? Or is it more of a case of out of sight out of mind? Also, what is your reaction when what was lost makes a sudden reappearance? And what difference does it make anyway? These questions are brought to mind when we consider our two readings today. Between the readings there is both a convergence and a contrast.

Let us consider first the convergence. In each of the readings, there is an attention-grabbing event, which prompts a simple explanation. In the first reading, the event is the dramatic healing of the man crippled from birth, which attracts many people to the apostles Peter and John. And when the religious authorities question them, Peter and John have only one explanation to offer: it is in the name of Jesus Christ the Nazorean… this man stands before you healed… Similarly, in the gospel, there is also an event that prompts an explanation. Despite having caught nothing after a whole night of fishing, the disciples suddenly net an enormous number of fish as a result of following the directions of the risen Jesus. The number of fish is so huge that they are not able to pull in the net. To which, the disciple whom Jesus loved has only this to say: It is the Lord. Event and explanation. Thus far the convergence.

But consider also the contrast in reactions towards the respective events and explanations. For the religious leaders in the first reading, both event and explanation together constitute a disturbance of the peace, a disruption of business as usual. They are anxious to clamp down, to put a lid, on it. They arrest the perpetrators and try to silence them by all means within their power. In the gospel, Simon Peter is also very much perturbed by what has happened, such that without giving a second thought to his own state of undress, he jumps into the sea. But here’s the contrast. Whereas the religious leaders try to muzzle the apostles and so to divert people’s attention away from both the event and its explanation, Simon Peter makes a straight dash towards its source.

This contrast in external actions invite us to reflect further on the likely interior dispositions that prompt them. But it is perhaps useful first to remember the people about whom we are reflecting. Both the religious leaders and Simon Peter, albeit to different degrees, are guilty people: the former for unjustly causing Jesus’ death, the latter for denying and deserting his Master in his time of greatest need. Yet both react so differently at Jesus’ return. By their actions, the religious leaders demonstrate that, for them, it has truly been a case of out of sight out of mind. Whereas Peter shows that even though he seemed to have reverted to his former occupation, his heart has been pining all the while for the Lord whom he denied. Absence makes the heart grow fonder. The contrast could not be more striking.

And it is also highly significant, especially as we continue to contemplate the Lord’s rising and its effects. For the miracle of Easter is truly experienced only by Peter and not the religious leaders. Although both are close enough to the event of the resurrection and its effects, it is only Peter who can claim to be a true witness, one who experiences it and shares it with others. It is only Peter who runs towards it and then proclaims it with power. Such is the Easter significance of our respective reactions to the Lord’s apparent absence.

What about us? When the Lord seems far away, is it out of sight out of mind? Or does absence make the heart grow fonder?