Ezekiel 37:1-14/1 John 5:4-10/St John 20:19-31
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
He was only a child. But a few days, perhaps a week old. It would be most fitting if he were eight days. Like all children he was anticipated with great joy. The reverse of innocent babes, he was born hideous and deformed. A wretched sight, too grotesque even for a mother’s love. In rejection, someone placed him on the steps of the great cathedral. In mercy, the priest took him in. He would become his father. And she, Notre Dame, Our Lady, would become his mother.
In the womb of the cruciform baptismal font he was given new life; reborn from above and welcomed with love into the arms of his Father in heaven and his Mother the Church. This hideously deformed child, rejected by the world, found sanctuary, peace, within the wounds of his Lord Jesus Christ. Too ugly, even for a name, he was now robed in the beauty of Christ’s righteousness and given a name, the name of his baptismal birthday. He was Quasimodo.
Such is the word picture painted in the 1831 novel, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, by Victor Hugo. The text was a political treatise, arguing in favor of the retention of the beautiful Gothic cathedral, Notre Dame de Paris. Yet the fictional work may serve for us as an analogy for our reality, our grotesque sin and merciful redemption.
For today is Quasimodo Geniti, sometimes known as “St Thomas Sunday,” for obvious reasons. But the historic name comes from first words of the introit in Latin, taken from First Peter: Quasimodo Geniti, as in the manner of newborn babes, long for the pure spiritual milk of the Word.
In the ancient Church the celebration of the Easter mystery was prolonged for an entire week. During this time interest was on the white-robed newly baptized. On the Saturday before Easter, during the Great Vigil, the catechumens would have received Holy Baptism, and then, welcomed from near darkness into a brilliantly light sanctuary, would have received the Lord’s Supper for the first time. In them, the early Christians relived the joyous experience of their own baptism, even as we did during the Easter Vigil.
On the Saturday after Easter (yesterday) the newly made Christians laid aside their white garments and replaced them with ordinary clothes. And the final admonition was spoken: As many of you as were baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ (Gal 3:27). On the following day - today, “White Sunday” - the newly baptized appeared for the first time in ordinary clothes and took their place among the body of Christ as newborn babes, as quasimodos. And the words from the Epistle speak of them: Everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world - our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?
And so it is that you are here, beloved. As newborn babes, you long for the spiritual milk of our Lord’s wholesome Word. You gathered together last Sunday to celebrate with one accord the Feast of the Resurrection of our Lord! And the Crucified One, the One who came by water and blood, was in the midst of you, with the living voice of His Word, speaking peace to your troubled consciences, forgiveness to your aching souls.
Victor Hugo painted a character who was the reverse of man - outwardly a hideously deformed creature, inwardly a pure and clean man. This is the opposite of us! Outwardly we appear clean and good. I’m not speaking of having bathed last night; but of our righteousness. We may look like we have it together. Put on our face and tell everyone things are going well. But inside we are deformed and hunched over by sin, grotesquely disfigured by guilt. In shame we avert our eyes, hoping no one will notice.
We are worse than hunchbacked Quasimodo, or unbelieving Thomas, we are the valley of dry, lifeless bones. Clean cut off. Left to become dust in our graves. As it is written, You were once dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked (Eph 2:1). Were once ‘corpses’ in our sins; worse than deformed, we were the walking dead.
Yet as from the lifeless clay, from the dust, the Lord breathed life into Adam, so now the Second Adam, Jesus Christ, comes into this room and breathes life into your dusty bones. He gives you His Holy Spirit, that is, He speaks His Word into your lifeless ears and faith is created and nourished. And He who came by water and blood, continues to come among you by water and blood.
For upon the Cross the side of this Adam was opened and out poured blood and water. Water, joined to His Spirit-breathed Word, is the Holy Baptism by which you are reborn from above. You, quasimodos, deformed and curved inward by sin, are welcomed through the womb of baptism into the arms of your mother the Church. You are marked with His death-defying Cross and rescued from the cruelty of a dying world.
Here you are nourished, as newborn babes, on the wholesome Word of Christ and His life-blood, poured out for you for the forgiveness of sins. For even now He continues to come among you by His Blood, testifying that your sins are forgiven, that you are washed clean by His Word, you are given new life by His Spirit. Here you find solace and sanctuary. Here you find peace in the wounds of Christ Jesus.
For it is here, every eighth day, that is, every Lord’s Day, every Sunday, which is the first day and the new day of the week, your crucified and risen Lord comes among you and shows you His hands and side; the scars of His love for you. He does so through His Office of the Holy Gospel. As He sent the Twelve to forgive and retain sins in His Name, so He continues to send His servants, His pastors, who forgive your sins in His stead and by His command. And He breathes His life-breathing Spirit into you through His Word of absolution.
Blessed are you, dear ones, for you have not seen and yet have believed. For you have heard, and faith cometh by hearing, and hearing of the Word of Christ. This is the testimony; the eye-witness accounts of the Apostles, that is written and preached so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His Name.
In the end, Quasimodo, the hideous man who found love and mercy within the Church and her Lord Jesus Christ, died caring for the body of his dear Esmerelda. He starved to death by her corpse. When the sextons of the cathedral attempted to remove his body from hers, he turned to dust. Once again, he is the picture of our own lives. For we shall return to the dust from whence we came, as we heard those 80 days ago on Ash Wednesday.
Yet even there the promise shall remain. For Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. As in Adam all die, so also in Christ, shall all be made alive (1 Cor 15:20, 22). Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves, O My people. And I will put My Spirit within you, and you, shall live forever with the Son, who together with the Father and the Spirit, be glory now and forevermore. Amen.
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen.
He was only a child. But a few days, perhaps a week old. It would be most fitting if he were eight days. Like all children he was anticipated with great joy. The reverse of innocent babes, he was born hideous and deformed. A wretched sight, too grotesque even for a mother’s love. In rejection, someone placed him on the steps of the great cathedral. In mercy, the priest took him in. He would become his father. And she, Notre Dame, Our Lady, would become his mother.
In the womb of the cruciform baptismal font he was given new life; reborn from above and welcomed with love into the arms of his Father in heaven and his Mother the Church. This hideously deformed child, rejected by the world, found sanctuary, peace, within the wounds of his Lord Jesus Christ. Too ugly, even for a name, he was now robed in the beauty of Christ’s righteousness and given a name, the name of his baptismal birthday. He was Quasimodo.
Such is the word picture painted in the 1831 novel, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, by Victor Hugo. The text was a political treatise, arguing in favor of the retention of the beautiful Gothic cathedral, Notre Dame de Paris. Yet the fictional work may serve for us as an analogy for our reality, our grotesque sin and merciful redemption.
For today is Quasimodo Geniti, sometimes known as “St Thomas Sunday,” for obvious reasons. But the historic name comes from first words of the introit in Latin, taken from First Peter: Quasimodo Geniti, as in the manner of newborn babes, long for the pure spiritual milk of the Word.
In the ancient Church the celebration of the Easter mystery was prolonged for an entire week. During this time interest was on the white-robed newly baptized. On the Saturday before Easter, during the Great Vigil, the catechumens would have received Holy Baptism, and then, welcomed from near darkness into a brilliantly light sanctuary, would have received the Lord’s Supper for the first time. In them, the early Christians relived the joyous experience of their own baptism, even as we did during the Easter Vigil.
On the Saturday after Easter (yesterday) the newly made Christians laid aside their white garments and replaced them with ordinary clothes. And the final admonition was spoken: As many of you as were baptized into Christ have been clothed with Christ (Gal 3:27). On the following day - today, “White Sunday” - the newly baptized appeared for the first time in ordinary clothes and took their place among the body of Christ as newborn babes, as quasimodos. And the words from the Epistle speak of them: Everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world - our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world except the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?
And so it is that you are here, beloved. As newborn babes, you long for the spiritual milk of our Lord’s wholesome Word. You gathered together last Sunday to celebrate with one accord the Feast of the Resurrection of our Lord! And the Crucified One, the One who came by water and blood, was in the midst of you, with the living voice of His Word, speaking peace to your troubled consciences, forgiveness to your aching souls.
Victor Hugo painted a character who was the reverse of man - outwardly a hideously deformed creature, inwardly a pure and clean man. This is the opposite of us! Outwardly we appear clean and good. I’m not speaking of having bathed last night; but of our righteousness. We may look like we have it together. Put on our face and tell everyone things are going well. But inside we are deformed and hunched over by sin, grotesquely disfigured by guilt. In shame we avert our eyes, hoping no one will notice.
We are worse than hunchbacked Quasimodo, or unbelieving Thomas, we are the valley of dry, lifeless bones. Clean cut off. Left to become dust in our graves. As it is written, You were once dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked (Eph 2:1). Were once ‘corpses’ in our sins; worse than deformed, we were the walking dead.
Yet as from the lifeless clay, from the dust, the Lord breathed life into Adam, so now the Second Adam, Jesus Christ, comes into this room and breathes life into your dusty bones. He gives you His Holy Spirit, that is, He speaks His Word into your lifeless ears and faith is created and nourished. And He who came by water and blood, continues to come among you by water and blood.
For upon the Cross the side of this Adam was opened and out poured blood and water. Water, joined to His Spirit-breathed Word, is the Holy Baptism by which you are reborn from above. You, quasimodos, deformed and curved inward by sin, are welcomed through the womb of baptism into the arms of your mother the Church. You are marked with His death-defying Cross and rescued from the cruelty of a dying world.
Here you are nourished, as newborn babes, on the wholesome Word of Christ and His life-blood, poured out for you for the forgiveness of sins. For even now He continues to come among you by His Blood, testifying that your sins are forgiven, that you are washed clean by His Word, you are given new life by His Spirit. Here you find solace and sanctuary. Here you find peace in the wounds of Christ Jesus.
For it is here, every eighth day, that is, every Lord’s Day, every Sunday, which is the first day and the new day of the week, your crucified and risen Lord comes among you and shows you His hands and side; the scars of His love for you. He does so through His Office of the Holy Gospel. As He sent the Twelve to forgive and retain sins in His Name, so He continues to send His servants, His pastors, who forgive your sins in His stead and by His command. And He breathes His life-breathing Spirit into you through His Word of absolution.
Blessed are you, dear ones, for you have not seen and yet have believed. For you have heard, and faith cometh by hearing, and hearing of the Word of Christ. This is the testimony; the eye-witness accounts of the Apostles, that is written and preached so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in His Name.
In the end, Quasimodo, the hideous man who found love and mercy within the Church and her Lord Jesus Christ, died caring for the body of his dear Esmerelda. He starved to death by her corpse. When the sextons of the cathedral attempted to remove his body from hers, he turned to dust. Once again, he is the picture of our own lives. For we shall return to the dust from whence we came, as we heard those 80 days ago on Ash Wednesday.
Yet even there the promise shall remain. For Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. As in Adam all die, so also in Christ, shall all be made alive (1 Cor 15:20, 22). Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves, O My people. And I will put My Spirit within you, and you, shall live forever with the Son, who together with the Father and the Spirit, be glory now and forevermore. Amen.
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