Dante's Easter Journey
Part 4: Easter Sunday Lives in All of Us.
Part 4: Easter Sunday
Easter Sunday Lives in All of Us
Did you know that the Divine Comedy takes place during Easter?
We meet Dante in the dark wood late on Maundy Thursday, and then he begins his descent on Good Friday. He comes back up from Hell on Holy Saturday, and continues the journey on the shores of Mount Purgatory, where he prepares for his ultimate journey through the heavens in Paradise.
Dante’s journey is an echo of Christ’s, and we’re meant to recognize ourselves in Dante, not because we’re trapped in Hell, but because we’ve all confronted darkness. The promise is this: the descent is never the end.
Christ rose. And through Him, so shall we.
He is Risen!
Christ’s Resurrection echoes through every corner of our lives. We’re the living image of God’s love, and we are rising, too. At the end of the day, that’s what reading the Divine Comedy is all about: we walk the path not as spectators, but as pilgrims. At each step of the journey, we learn with Dante to live with the hope and promise of redemption.
Even when the world feels chaotic and opinions pull us in every direction, Dante’s journey reminds us this Easter Sunday to cast our anchor on the rock that holds firm through every storm—the One that matters most. The One that gives meaning not just to our lives, but to the fallen world we inhabit. We are of this world but not of it, and that’s bound to get frustrating sometimes. That’s why we need to carry Easter with us, not just this Sunday, but every day of the year.
He is Risen, indeed!
“The love that moves the sun and the other stars.”
By SJ Murray
The Greats Story Lab was founded by SJ Murray, Ph.D. (Princeton), a Professor at Baylor University and EMMY®-nominated filmmaker, and Imagineer Courtney Becker. The Greats is about bringing the great literary works to the people once again, using film and other creative media. Not only have they worked on Dante but also on Boethius as well as shorter projects on Plato, Shakespeare and more. To a lot of people, reading the classics is a daunting thought, but in not engaging we miss out on contemplating the big questions of life that drove these writers, and form a back-drop to our daily lives. Additionally, we miss out on what has gone into the foundations and building of what one might call Western civilisation. Please go to their website here, or their youtube page here to learn more.