Happy Easter!

Wishing each other a Happy Easter is an automatic salute that most of us this morning will wish to all those we meet. The theological meaning of this phrase is profound, while the implications for everyday life are enormous. Jesus's resurrection was God's greatest act of love for man, and must lead the believer to seek intimacy intensely with the Trinity.

It is a source of hope and joy for us because the Scriptures assure us that what God did for Jesus, he will do for us. One day he will come close to our tomb - we do not know where or how this moment will be - and he will say the same thing to us as Jesus said to the dead young man: "Son/daughter, it is I who speak: get up." This is how we, too, will resurrect."

Pope Benedict XVI told his regular weekly public audience last Wednesday that the celebrations of Holy Week and Easter remind the faithful that "evil does not have the last word".

The Pope remarked that during Holy Week "we relive the Passion, death and resurrection of Our Lord" and the Church's devotions should stimulate "the desire to follow Jesus more closely". He then outlined the liturgical celebrations of Holy Thursday and Good Friday. On Holy Saturday, he said, "the Church is spiritually united with Mary, praying by the tomb of the Son of God who lies at rest after completing his work of redemption". Then at the Easter vigil the Church celebrates Christ's victory over death.

The Pope noted that our beliefs should encourage us to "commit ourselves with greater courage and enthusiasm to creating a more just world".

We Christians do not look with disdain at created reality. On the contrary, the Incarnation and the Resurrection highlight the great value of creation. In the Incarnation Christ became man: i.e. a created being. After the Resurrection, Christ - man and God - returned to the glory he enjoyed from eternity at the bosom of the Father. The Resurrection is the guarantee that those who live in the love of the Father - all of us created beings - will share the same glory.

Living in the love of the Father means building a just and peaceful world, which is worthy of the dignity of humans, created in God's image and saved by Christ's death and resurrection.

In this respect every Easter is an occasion to renew ourselves so that our commitment towards the attainment of such an ideal everywhere could be achieved.

Our personal renewal is a must and a need, since as Pope Benedict noted last Wednesday: "We know that we are sinners." In this respect his appeal for the reception of a sacramental confession is valid both before and after Easter. Confession and absolution, the Pope said, strengthen believers to become "apostles of peace in a world that is, unfortunately, still marked by division and suffering".

A "'Happy Easter"' is much more than a polite salute. It's a commitment to a different kind of living.