Hope in Difficult Times

by Fr. Tony Okolo C.S.Sp., V.F.  |  05/04/2025  |  Weekly Reflection

Beloved Parishioners,

May the joy and peace of the risen Lord inundate our hearts and lighten up our ways! The past couple of days have been laden with a lot of mixed feelings and sombre emotions for all of us and that’s quite understandable. We woke to the joy of Easter only to be greeted by the sudden passing of our dearest Pope Francis, an event that threw all of us into mourning.

But I like to think that everything happening now in the context of Easter as well as the Jubilee Year of Hope which Pope Francis himself instituted is prophetic and has a lot to tell us. It seems to me like a practical message that we should never lose sight of hope regardless of what the condition is, and this message is reinforced by the risen Lord through his resurrection.

We must be sure of this: hope is not optimism or naivety but a theological virtue that orients us to trust God’s fidelity and enables us to live morally. It is the quiet strength that rises when everything else seems to fall away and it is ultimately the product of our faith and trust in God. It’s not loud or showy — often, it’s a whisper in the dark, a flicker in the heart, the stubborn refusal to give in to the temptations of despair. In difficult times, when fear and uncertainty cloud the path ahead, hope becomes both an anchor and a compass. It grounds us in something deeper than circumstance, and it points us toward something greater than what we see, the assurance of Christ.

One character with which we can distinguish hope is that it does not deny the weight of suffering. It does not ignore the pain, loss, or confusion that life often brings. Instead, it walks with us through the valley, reminding us that this moment is not the end of the story. Hope sees the cross and still believes in resurrection. It knows that, even in silence, God is near. In times of sickness, grief, or global unrest, hope asks us to trust — not in outcomes we can control, but in a God who is faithful, even in the storm. This is why Paul counsels us when he writes in Romans 5:3-5 that “We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame.” We hope because we are loved. We hope because mercy is greater than judgment. We hope because Christ has gone before us — and He is risen.

When we decide to consider it with regard to our eschatological hope, one beautiful assurance the resurrection of Christ has for us Christians is that death shall not have the last word. We are going to rise in glory like Christ and we shall be with him in the same way we died with him at Baptism. It is still with this hope in the resurrection that the Church enters the traditional nine days of praying and mourning for Pope Francis called Novemdiales. As we reflect on the outcome of his life and his legacies of peace, humility, and care for creation, we pray for the repose of his soul hoping that God who he served so well grants him a place among his saints in heaven. And even now, the Apostolic See is declared Sede Vacante, we also hope and pray for the cardinals who will soon be in the Sistine chapel for the conclave, that the risen Lord will grant them the fortitude and courage to carry out the task required of them at this time, judiciously.

Finally, the celebration of the resurrection of Christ in Easter reminds us that hope is born precisely in the shadow of death. The empty tomb is the ultimate sign that even the gravest suffering and loss do not have the final word and so we are called to be witnesses of this hope — not just in celebration but in our response to despair around us. It dares us to live out the joys of resurrection. This is why we joyfully recall the words of Peter in 1 Peter 1:3, when he says, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.”