Easter and Jesus Christ’s resurrection have always been inseparable from His passion and death on the cross on top of the Hill of Golgotha. All three are part of a series of events and are interrelated.
By
ROBERTUS RUBIYATMOKO
·5 minutes read
Easter and Jesus Christ’s resurrection have always been inseparable from His passion and death on the cross on top of the Hill of Golgotha. All three are part of a series of events and are interrelated.
Jesus Christ’s resurrection from the realm of death was the fruit of His adherence to the will of God the Father in salvaging mankind. Due to mankind’s sins, the relation between God and man was ruined. This had dragged man away and separated him from God’s blessings.
God, who does not wish for the destruction of man whom He loves so much, set out to restore His relationship with man by sending Jesus Christ, His only son. Jesus was sent to bring peace and bring back together God and man. He presented Himself in His role as peacemaker and unifier of God and man.
Interestingly, the reconciliation of the God/man relationship could only happen through the passion and death of Jesus on the cross. In order to realize this mission of salvation, Jesus sacrificed himself by dying on the cross.
Therefore, the crucifixion event -- which was none other than the passion and death of Christ -- became a means to reconciliation. Through Jesus’ death on the cross and His resurrection, God’s salvation of man had been achieved and, therefore, man now leads a new life in unity with God.
From these events, we can conclude that His crucifixion and death on top of the Hill of Golgotha was His sacrifice to redeem man’s sins. Through redemption, man -- who should have died from his sins -- was freed and gained a new life. Jesus was fully aware of this sacrifice and this was His free choice and a necessity for the sake of reconciliation or redemption.
Jesus knew and fully realized that only through His passion and death on the cross that redemption or salvation of man could be achieved.
Therefore, His death on the cross was neither foolhardy nor in vain. It was not an act done under coercion and without freedom; neither was it an act without personal will. With all His sincerity, He deliberately chose to go the way of the cross as a means towards peace. He did this with full freedom as a manifestation of His adherence to the will of God the Father.
This path of self-sacrifice must be chosen with freedom and walked voluntarily and with joy for the sake of reconciliation between God and man.
Must be fought for
Learning from Jesus, we can understand that reconciliation or peace cannot be assumed but must be seriously fought for through self-sacrifice.
The struggle in achieving reconciliation in our collective life is similar. Reconciliation among Indonesians is only possible if all the people voluntarily and without coercion sacrifice themselves for the interest of others and for the greater good. It should not be the other way around, namely sacrificing others for the interests of ourselves or our group.
Self-sacrifice can only be achieved if each group no longer thinks only about themselves, their families or their groups and prioritize the interests of others and the greater good. If every member of society is freed from seeking their own and their groups’ profits and prioritizes the unity of all, reconciliation will occur.
We all see how our collective life has been harmed by incidents deliberately triggered to divide our unity and togetherness. Various acts of intolerance and terrorism are deliberately perpetrated by certain groups to spread fear and distrust among members of society.
They joyfully celebrate when they see brothers and sisters fight one another through speeches of hatred and acts of violence, including through persecution and murder. This is exacerbated by hoaxes that lead to confusion and unrest.
Another condition we must respond to is the rampant corruption from the lowest to highest level of government. Corruption is an immoral act as it steals people’s right to welfare.
As a result, poverty reigns everywhere as funds for people’s welfare do not reach its intended target. This culture of corruption must be eradicated and replaced with a culture of honest and clean living.
It is time for all Indonesians to respond to these conditions with constructive criticisms, namely by rejecting all efforts that cause disunity and enmity.
A critical stance is becoming increasingly urgent in these years of democracy celebration in 2018 and 2019. Learning from our experience, it is always too easy for issues of ethnicity, religion, race and intergroup relations to be abused to spread disunity and intimidate people for certain political gains. Therefore, political education is necessary to build a society with a vast and integral perspective of nationhood.
This way, whatever differences people may have in their political choices, unity will remain. In the end, people are smart and they can choose the proper leaders who sincerely wish and are capable of guaranteeing the people’s interests, fighting for unity in diversity and defending the Unitary State based on Pancasila and the 1945 Constitution.
Hopefully the celebration of Easter or Jesus’ resurrection inspires us all to achieve reconciliation and peace in Indonesia. This is our home, together.
Robertus Rubiyatmoko, Archbishop, Archdiocese of Semarang