We welcome Bridget Biersner, Chad Cosens, Kelle Miller, and Robert Michael Murphy into our Catholic faith and Sacramental life. They each made a commitment to attend the RCIA sessions each week beginning in September, culminating with their Profession of Faith this Easter weekend. More significantly, they each desire to renew, rediscover their Christian faith and relationship with God. I’m grateful to their respective families for supporting them throughout this venture of faith. Certainly, this RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults) program still leaves portions of our Catholic faith and traditions to be discovered; but then again, we are all on a life long journey of faith, discovering and renewing our relationship with God through the traditions, the prayers, the Sacramental life of the Church. Of the many and various Easter reflections this anecdote by Peg Ekerdt gives us a fresh look at the possibilities of the ultimate promise we call the Resurrection—our Easter moment. (Peg Ekerdt works for the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Kansas City.) For many years I kept a note card on my refrigerator that proclaimed the message: "We are an Easter people." I was sent the note from a parishioner, a mother of 13 and grandmother of more, who was living with advanced-stage breast cancer at the time the card was written. . . .I remember opening this Easter greeting and reading it several times. It did not say "Happy Easter," nor did it say, "Rejoice, the Lord is risen." It said, "We are an Easter people." As I read the card, I knew it bore a message of profound faith. As her death approached, Barb wanted all whom she loved to know that the power of faith transforms even death. For we are an Easter people. . . .In the face of illness and death, to be sure, this proclamation of faith is a consolation. Yet in all times, this proclamation holds the potential to be an everyday guide: We are an Easter people. What then does it look like to be an Easter people? . . .If we start at the very beginning and search the Acts accounts of the Easter season scriptures, we learn how that very first community of Jesus' followers began to shape their priorities and create a way of life. From the record of those early days, a modus operandi begins to emerge. Within the early community, "there was no needy person among them" (Acts 4:34). Those who “had” gave to the apostles to distribute to those in need. . . .As the community developed attitudes, rules and a self-image, the Spirit was at work among them . At first, the Jesus followers shunned the newly converted Paul. They feared that he had not changed and would turn on them. But they came to believe, with the help of their own Barnabas, that radical change is the sure sign of the work of the Spirit of Jesus (Acts 9:27). Those early folks also had presumptions about whom God favored and loved the best. In time they understood that God truly shows no partiality (Acts 10:34) among humankind. All are equal in the sight of God. And finally, there was a clear message on that Ascension day that Easter people do not dawdle looking up at the sky but must live as active witnesses to faith wherever they are (Acts 1:11). In response to these guidelines, we might say that times are very different now. . . .We might want to ignore faith’s invitation to change that invites a re-examination of our own priorities, our words and actions and even our use of time. We might want to say those things and more, but the truth of scripture is ever ours, speaking anew to us each day, calling us to be truly an Easter people. To be honest, there are Easter people in all of our parish communities whose faithfulness inspires our own. They are the ones who trust the Spirit's presence, even in the midst of adversity. . . .They are the ones who accept their own illnesses as opportunities to reveal God's love to others. We are the Easter people who believe that the cross transformed all suffering and pain, and the Resurrection secured the promise of eternal life. It is this Paschal Mystery, this Easter faith, that we are called to live each day. Pope John Paul II reiterated these thoughts by his ministry, humanity, and his very public declining health and dependence—reflecting his own words: “Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song.” From the staff and myself of our Ascension Parish—St. John, St. Malachy, Sacred Heart—we extend a blessing to all our parishioners and visitors this Easter; and, “thank you” for sharing your faith and presence and prayers within our Eucharist and parish activities. Easter Blessings, Fr. Tim FYI:. “Our Lord has written the promise of resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime.” (Martin Luther King Jr.)