Love is in the air

Love is in the air

Everywhere I look around

Love is in the air

Every sight and every sound...

John Paul Young's cheery lyrics were the first thing I heard when I briefly tuned in to Smooth FM this morning. And oh yes: Love is in the air, is always, everywhere in the air... but especially so today, as we celebrate Jesus' Resurrection - Love's everlasting triumph over sin and death. But how, Pope Leo asked in his Urbi et Orbi message, was Jesus able to be victorious? What is the strength with which he defeated once and for all the ancient adversary, the prince of this world (cf. Jn 12:31)?... 

And the reply: This strength, this power, is God himself for he is Love who creates and generates, Love who is faithful to the end and Love who forgives and redeems. And so yes; Love is in the air, permeating our lives, and every corner of our world, including - particularly - those places and situations where Love seems most absent. 

And I don't know if I'm just dreaming

Don't know if I feel sane

But it's something that I must believe in

And it's there when you call out my name

Isn't this what happened to Mary Magdalen, when Jesus radiantly broke through her anxiety and grief simply by saying her name? And isn't this how Jesus radiantly breaks through into all our lives, our pain and anxieties, our weaknesses, wanderings and preoccupations, when he calls each one of us by our name... Maybe the name, written in his Heart, by which we are most intimately known...?

And I don't know if I'm being foolish

Don't know if I'm being wise

But it's something that I must believe in

And it's there when I look in your eyes

And when we look at Jesus, coming to meet us, we must - can only - believe in Love, and respond by allowing him to expand our hearts, and fill us, and all our blessed and broken realities, with the joy of his glorious, all-encompassing presence. 

Love is in the air

Everywhere I look around

Love is in the air

Every sight and every sound...

May we all see Love, breathe in and be filled with Love, everywhere, and in every sight and sound...

Happy Easter everyone! 

Christ is Risen!
Indeed he is risen, Alleluia!