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Homily for Wednesday of the Second Week of Easter, 27 April 2022, Jn 3:16-21
We have a funny situation in our first reading today from Acts. The disciples have been jailed for public disturbance. But they are released from prison by an angel and the guards are not even aware of it. When they are summoned to appear before the Sanhedrin, the court officers could not produce them. They report that the prison cell where the disciples were detained was empty, even if the guards were stationed outside and the jail doors were locked. And where would they find them? Right there in the temple area preaching—out in the open. They did not even attempt to run away or go into hiding. And when they were arrested again, they did not even resist.
From their formerly fearful disposition, these Galilean fishermen have become totally fearless. From the moment they got out of that upper room where they were hiding like wounded dogs, they had had totally changed. They were no longer the type who could be intimidated by threats from the authorities. And yet they are not going around like aggressive or violent rebels. They are like meek lambs that the authorities did not know what to do with.
They are supposed to be the ones under trial by the authorities. But their roles are reversed. It’s like the authorities are now the ones under trial. They don’t even need to be condemned; their stubborn refusal to believe has already condemned them, as Jesus puts it in our Gospel today. They have condemned themselves for having condemned an innocent man.
This is what John is saying at the latter part of the Gospel. He says, “This is the verdict, that the light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil.”
John seems to be emphasizing the ironic situation in which the ones who are being pursued are out in the open, in the full view of people, while the ones are pursuing them are carrying out their wicked plots secretly. And so, John says, “For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light so that his works might not be exposed.”
It makes sense. A burglar who breaks into a house in order to steal will check first if there is a CCTV camera and a street lamp outside. He would rather do his wicked deed in the dark so as not to get caught.
It was like that at the height of the extrajudicial killings in our diocese before the pandemic began. Whenever the families of victims approached the barangay authorities to ask to review the recorded footages supposedly captured by the CCTVs in order to disprove the common claim that they died because they had fought back, almost always the answer was, “Sorry, the CCTVs are not functioning.” There were many partners in the crimes that had been committed during those years.
Not only do they hate CCTVs and street lamps, they also hate independent media people who investigate, who ask questions, who publish their reports. Of course they do not want the truth to come out. Why would they want their evil deeds to be exposed to the public? They prefer to stick to their ready-made templates with made-up narratives. And of course, they insist, that they were just doing their jobs by keeping the community free of criminality.
The same thing applies to the many paid trolls and agents of social media disinformation nowadays. It is hard to track them down. You open their FB profiles and you don’t get much information. Evil does indeed thrive in secrecy.
But here’s the good news, the Gospel says it in the final line. “But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that their works may be clearly seen as done in God.” They do not mind submitting their SALNs, or getting their projects audited. They are open books and they do not feel threatened by people who interview them about their past or demand accountability. They have nothing to hide.
You see why I’ve told you on many occasions that the empty tomb was never used as evidence to the resurrection? People could indeed claim that the cadaver had been stolen. In fact even the disciples themselves thought that way at the start.
The best evidence to the resurrection were the disciples themselves. From their old fearful and insecure selves, they literally became fearless. They came out of hiding and boldly faced arrest and martyrdom. They were no longer afraid to speak the truth. They themselves became the best evidence to the risen Christ alive, and at work in and through them. They fulfilled what Jesus had earlier told them in Matthew 10:27, “What I say to you in the darkness, speak in the light; what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops.”
