2024 Easter Message from Bishop McGrattan

At Easter we as Christians renew our baptismal promises. It is a reminder each year that it is through the life-giving death and resurrection of Jesus Christ that we are baptized and united with Him. Easter takes us beyond the Cross and the shadow of suffering, sorrow and disappointment to reveal the joy and hope that comes in knowing the Risen Lord. 
This experience of Christ transformed the first disciples. They came to know that His love is for every human person and that the fullness of eternal life is found in Him alone. This is the promise and hope that Easter brings into our lives!

Easter can also be a time to reflect on our life in Christ. To see if our lives of faith in fact express the love that our Lord offers to those who live in the shadow of the Cross. It is a love that restores dignity to those who have been exiled from their homes, transforming strangers into neighbours, and calling us to respond with justice, compassion, and care to those who are suffering and who are vulnerable due to the circumstances of their lives. That Easter faith that allowed the disciples to not simply see the tragedy of Jesus death but also through that very experience to know the power of His resurrection. It became for them a renewed experience of forgiveness and reconciliation and that they had new life in the risen Christ.
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Easter calls us to renew the witness of our faith through the living testimony of our lives. It calls us to move beyond the tomb of human emptiness by sharing with conviction the good news of the Resurrection. We are called to courageously follow Jesus Christ, the Risen One, and to boldly proclaim that out of the darkness of human suffering comes the promise of new life. This Easter, in renewing our baptismal profession of faith may we authentically live that faith in serving our brothers and sisters in ways that will bring them hope and joy in Christ.

As the Risen Lord stood among his first disciples in the upper room, he said, “Peace be to you” and this greeting restored their faith. In our current world and culture, we must continue to believe in faith that the Lord Jesus stands in our midst and says, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give to you: not as the world gives, do I give to you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid” (John 14:27). 

This Easter let this become our heartfelt petition for many of our brothers and sisters who continue to experience the ongoing tragedy of war and violence. 

+William T. McGrattan
Bishop of Calgary

​Written by Most Rev.  William T. McGrattan, Bishop of Calgary
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​March 26, 2023