The Walk to Emmaus

Dear Friends,

Some Gospel stories appeal to us with immediacy. We identify with their message with little or no difficulty. The prodigal father and the wedding feast at Cana are two such stories. The walk to Emmaus – today’s Gospel – is a third.

Today we find two dejected disciples leaving Jerusalem by foot, late on Easter Day. They have abandoned the other disciples who are huddled together behind locked doors in the upper room. Fear and anxiety plagued all of them. We know the name of one of the disciples heading toward Emmaus – Cleophas. Some people say the other disciple was his wife, Mary. Perhaps it was you or I.

How often in our lives have we known suffering, death, destruction. We’ve known Jesus’ passion and death and perhaps have been overwhelmed by them – failing to realize that the passion of Jesus was indispensable to His journey. Like Cleophas and his companion, perhaps we, too, have felt like losers, the unlucky followers of a failed prophet.

Jesus met them, meets us on the way. No berating. No words of disappointment or rejection. No anger. Jesus is a fellow traveler.

Through their tender interaction with Jesus, something stirred in them, in us. Balm upon our weary souls. Hearts burning with love within us in moments of bleakness or weakness.

And then it was night. Time to stop to be refreshed. Even on the midst of their sadness, Cleophas and his companion were hospitable, inviting Jesus to stay with them. They would be His hosts for supper. How little did they know that soon, the guest would become the host and would offer them living bread as well.

We, too, stop to be refreshed on the way. Each week we come to Eucharist, bearing the scope of our lives. We bring our marriages, friendships, relationships that have gone bad. We bring our hopes for a troubled world, our thanks for heartwarming surprises and ordinary good health. We bring everything to a faithful God who receives us and gives us His very self in return. We know Him in the breaking of the bread.

But we do not stay at Eucharist, even as Cleophas and his companion did not stay at table after Jesus disappeared from their sight. They didn’t linger to relish what they had experienced.

Quickly, the Scripture says, quickly they went back to Jerusalem to share the good news. Joy – the taste of God’s presence – is a gift to be shared with others.

So they went – and their good news was met by the good news of the other disciples. We have seen Him!

As we consider the Emmaus story in our own lives, where do we find ourselves? Are we running away from the pain and frustration of life, from a God who doesn’t seem risen or present to us? Or are our hearts already burning inside us and we don’t know how to interpret the movement within? Have we come to the table and been fed by the Lord? Have we returned to the community of believers, ready to do our part to help the community of faith thrive?

Easter means that great reversals are possible. The disciples on the road to Emmaus knew such reversals.

If we allow it, the disciples on the road in Rochester, Henrietta, Parma, Canandaigua will know the same.

P.S. The painting of Cleophas and Mary dining with Jesus in Emmaus featured at the head of this blog is the work of Rochester artist Dick Kane. It is part of a triptych which can be seen at Our Lady of Lourdes Church in Brighton.

~Sister Joan Sobala