The people who became full members of the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil offer an inspiring witness to the risen Christ today, Washington Cardinal Wilton Gregory said at Easter Sunday Masses that he celebrated on April 9 at the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle and at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.

“They are a sign for us all that the spirit of Christ is still very active in the world,” Cardinal Gregory said at his Easter Sunday Mass that morning at the cathedral.

Noting that day’s reading from the Gospel of John, where Mary Magdalene on Easter morning found the empty tomb with its stone seal broken and saw scattered burial cloths, the cardinal said those people who received the Sacraments of Initiation at the Easter Vigil – Baptism, Confirmation and Communion – “are the symbolic stone seals that have been broken, the burial garments cast about that today witness to Christ’s Resurrection.”

Cardinal Gregory noted how in a skeptical age with many competing religious systems and with many people not believing in God, those people who joined the Catholic Church did so despite societal and church scandals and challenges.

“With a sincere love in their heart for Christ and for our Catholic family of faith, which Christ commissioned to continue His presence in our world, our Church grew,” the cardinal said.

Across The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Washington about 1,000 people became full members of the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil that previous evening.

“Sophisticated adults and precocious young people who know ‘life’s score’ were plunged into the waters of Baptism and anointed with sacred oil and feasted at the Lord’s Table for the first time last night,” said the cardinal.

At St. Matthew’s Cathedral at the Easter Vigil, seven adults and children received the sacraments of Baptism, Confirmation and the Eucharist. Also at the cathedral, six candidates for full communion who had already been baptized received the sacraments of Confirmation and Communion, and a Catholic woman completing her Sacraments of Initiation was confirmed and received her First Communion.

“Our new brothers and sisters in faith stand as happy expressions of the Church’s vitality. We too, you and I, the oldest Catholics and middle aged Catholics, are called to be similar witnesses,” Cardinal Gregory said. “We must run to the tomb, some huffing and puffing because of age, or carefully walking with hopeful but skeptical hearts to see those signs of the risen Christ’s victory over death and the beginning of the fullness of life for all of us.”

He later added, “It only takes a few witnesses to convince our hearts to believe.”

Both of the Masses of the Easter Sunday of the Resurrection of the Lord opened with the hymn, “Jesus Christ is Risen Today.”

As that morning’s Mass began at the cathedral, the cardinal in his prayer noted, “The Church gathers with great joy on this Easter Sunday, thankful for all that God has given us and done for us, especially in raising His Son from the dead.”

The cathedral’s red-robed Schola Cantorum choir was accompanied by a brass quintet and led the congregation in singing the joyful Irish Alleluia before the gospel account of Jesus’s Resurrection.

After his homily, Cardinal Gregory led the people crowding the cathedral in renewing their baptismal promises, professing that they believe that Jesus rose from the dead and is seated at the right hand of the Father, and they believe in the resurrection of the body and life everlasting.

Cardinal Gregory and the concelebrating priests, including Msgr. W. Ronald Jameson, the cathedral’s rector, sprinkled holy water on the people gathered there. 

The prayer intentions included that people would be inspired by the risen Christ to seek the priesthood, consecrated life and to be active lay people, and that the parish community would through its service to others proclaim the good news of Jesus’s resurrection.

Later in the Mass, the cardinal recited a familiar prayer that reflected the new life that the risen Christ offers, as he said, “By dying he destroyed our death, by rising he restored our life.”

Later at the National Shrine’s noontime Easter Sunday Mass celebrated by the cardinal, the standing-room-only congregation and those watching via the Eternal Word Television Network and through the basilica’s livestream were welcomed by Msgr. Walter Rossi, the rector there.

“May our Easter prayer uplift our hearts today and fill us with the new life the Resurrection brings,” Msgr. Rossi said.

During his homily at the Easter Sunday Mass at the basilica, Cardinal Gregory again praised how those who became full members of the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil offer an inspiring witness of the risen Christ.

As he concluded his homily, the cardinal offered a personal Easter blessing, saying, “May you and all of your loved ones find such signs of Christ’s victory this Easter, and may your hearts and your homes be filled with the joy that faith both ignites and sustains.”

The cardinal noted that the Archdiocese of Washington has “grown much richer today with our new Catholics,” and he wished a happy Easter season to families in parishes throughout the archdiocese and to guests and visitors. 

“Those newest Catholics are a wonderful invitation to believe, and those who have been Catholics for many years are also called to be witnesses of the resurrected Lord Jesus,” Cardinal Gregory said.