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Scripture Reflections for Holy Saturday at the Easter Vigil

Year A, Lectionary 41

We await the light amidst the darkness in this Easter Vigil. We hear the history of God among us through scripture and how we enter in the new reality of resurrection. As we approach the darkness of the tomb we are introduced to the light of resurrection and the new life in the risen Christ. We are to praise God and move forward without fear having met Jesus.

Hate feeling lost on Sundays at church? Searching for a better explanation of the Bible than what you hear from your pastor's sermon? Check out the following collection of audio, video, and text commentaries from various Christian experts for a better understanding of today's scripture that deal with: Abraham • Angel • Baptism • Choice • Covenant • Creation • Cross • Darkness • Death • Eucharist • Evangelize • Fear • Focus • History • Isaiah • Journey • Kingdom • Light • Love • Martin Luther King Jr. • Mary of Magdala • Mask • Mission • Moses • Proclaim • Resurrection • Salvation • Sin • Stone • Suffering • Teach • Tomb • Women •

Genesis 1:1-31, 2:1-2
Psalm 104:1-2, 5-6, 10, 12-14, 24, 35 or
Psalm 33:4-7, 12-13, 20, 22
Genesis 22:1-18
Psalm 16:5, 8-11
Exodus 14:15-31, 15:1
Exodus 15:1-6, 17-18
Isaiah 54:5-14
Psalm 30:2, 4-6, 11-13
Isaiah 55:1-11
Isaiah 12:2-6
Baruch 3:9-15, 32-38, 4:1-4
Psalm 19:8-11
Ezekiel 36:16-28
Psalm 42:3, 5; 43:3-4 or Isaiah 12:2-6 or Psalm 51:12-15, 18-19
Romans 6:3-11
“Baptism is in short our participation in not just the death of Jesus Christ but also his resurrection. Baptism is not just our participation in his burial into the waters of death but also our participation in his resurrection from the waters of death through the power of the Holy Spirit.”

"Baptism in Romans 6"
Brant Pitre
May 7, 2020
Tags: Baptism, Creation
“very rarely, however, have I been to a baptism where the baptism was described as crucifixion. As a co-crucifixion with Christ where the emphasis was put on the fact that...this person is being baptized into the death of Jesus. But that's how Paul sees baptism”

"Baptized into His Death"
Brant Pitre
Tags: Baptism, Death, Resurrection
Psalm 118:1-2, 16-17, 22-23
Matthew 28:1-10
“Matthew is making a subtle point. Although the Passion Narrative tells us what human beings did to Jesus, the entire gospel story is really about what God is doing for human beings in the person of his Son.”

"He is Risen!"
Fr. Geoffrey Plant
April 2, 2023
Tags: Angel, Mary of Magdala, Resurrection
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Torch
"Preaching the Resurrection"
Fr. Fergus Kerr
March 31, 2002

“Matthew is saying, faith in Jesus as Lord already existed in these women—before the apostles ever began to preach. Indeed, these women’s recognition of Jesus as Lord happened on their way to calling the disciples together to become the apostolic community.”

Tags: Resurrection, Mary of Magdala, Mission, Women
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Australian Women Preach
"Easter Sunday"
Elizabeth Young RSM
April 9, 2023

“Jesus has proved God's limitless love all the way to the end, which we discover is no longer death but eternal life”

Tags: Fear, Resurrection
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Word on Fire
"The Earthquake and the Light"
Bishop Robert Barron
March 31, 2002

“If we see it simply as a nice happy day, we can dress up and enjoy the nice weather, we haven't experienced it...Only when it shakes the foundations of our lives have we sensed its power and its importance.”

Tags: Resurrection, Creation, Teach, Fear, Evangelize
Overall Readings
“what Matthew is definitely showing his audience is that Jesus is raised from the dead, Jesus ushers in the beginning of the new creation on the same day God makes the old creation”

"The New Creation"
Brant Pitre
April 6, 2020
Tags: Creation, Baptism, Light
“For Easter helps you and I to realize: life's not over, it's just beginning”

Fr. John Paul Forté, OP
April 16, 2023
Tags: Resurrection, Journey, Light
“Jesus of Nazareth is not a dead man. His story is about life. His story is about love. His story is about companionship. His story is about relationship. His story is about giving ourselves so that others may live.”

Fr. Oscar Pratt
April 16, 2022
Tags: Resurrection, Proclaim, Martin Luther King Jr.
“That's the work we do, to sing glory, to sing hallelujah, to tell somebody out there that God is alive. That God raised his son from death. That our heavenly Father is the only one who can reach into the jaws of death and bring out life.”

Monsignor Raymond East
April 16, 2022
Tags: Resurrection, Baptism
“When we look at one another it has to mean something to us that God sees us as very good”

Fr. Oscar Pratt
April 3, 2021
Tags: Love
“For resurrection always offers us new possibilities. It offers us the possibility of what? Being forgiven and to forgive.”

Fr. John Paul Forté, OP
April 16, 2021
Tags: Resurrection
“Jesus says 'for you to fully embrace me...you have to love yourself. You have to be able to see in yourself the Christ that lives in you. You have to appreciate the beauty and the uniqueness that God has created in you.'”

Fr. Oscar Pratt
April 11, 2020
Tags: Cross, Resurrection, Love, Mask
“Is God not with us? God is with us and that's what Easter celebrates. How much God is with us. God takes the flesh like you and I and walks through every moment of human existence. Fear, and stubbornness, and worry, and viruses. And still decides to be with us.”

Fr. John Paul Forté, OP
April 11, 2020
Tags: Resurrection, Fear
“As we celebrate the resurrection on this alleluia-filled Easter day, may we never have to ask again 'who will roll the stone away?'”

Fr. Tony Ricard
April 8, 2023
Tags: Stone, Tomb, Resurrection, Proclaim
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A Catholic Moment
"The Easter Vigil"
John Ciribassi
April 8, 2023

“we have choices every day of our lives. And those choices can take us closer to the Father or they can lead us away. We can allow our emotions to guide our decisions or allow God’s word, springing forth from the pages of Scripture, to guide us in the correct direction.”

Tags: Choice
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The Sacred Page
"The Easter Vigil"
John Bergsma
April 14, 2022

“the incarnation was also a “marriage” of human and divine nature which seemed to be “divorced” by the death of Christ, only to be quickly restored and resumed by the Resurrection. So Easter is the re-affirmation of God’s uniting of his nature to ours in the mystical marriage of the hypostatic union.”

Tags: History, Covenant, Salvation, Abraham, Moses, Kingdom, Isaiah, Sin, Baptism, Eucharist
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A Catholic Moment
"Offer It Up"
John Ciribassi
April 3, 2021

“No matter what type of suffering the world can throw at us, none of it can compare to what Jesus endured…for us. And he did not allow suffering to sidetrack His mission and His love of the Father…and His mission of sharing the Good News of the Father with anyone who would listen”

Tags: Suffering, Focus
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A Catholic Moment
"The Night of a New Creation"
Fr. Lawrence Obilor
April 11, 2020

“And just like in the first moment of creation, nobody witnessed it except the One who has the power to create. He chose to rise in the silence of the night to show his victory over darkness and to reconnect us to the event of the first creation. But in this case, He did not just create, He equally redeemed.”

Tags: Creation, Resurrection, Covenant, Light, Darkness
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Torch
"Enduring Love"
Fr. Timothy Radcliffe
April 24, 2011

“Eternal life is not another life that begins after one has died. It is our love of the Lord, which begins now and which death cannot destroy”

Tags: Resurrection, Death
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