Bishop Rhoades delivered the following homily at the Easter Vigil at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Fort Wayne on April 4, 2026. Joe Romie The Church calls tonight’s liturgy “The Easter Vigil in the Holy Night.” The Church mandates that it take place at night. It can’t take place in the evening before the sun sets. It must begin in the darkness of night after the sun sets. It is in darkness that we await the light. On this holy night, the Church keeps vigil, waiting for the resurrection of the Lord. Night has its own significance: darkness, ignorance, fear, death. It is in the darkness that the Easter fire was lit outside at the beginning of this liturgy. I blessed the fire, asking God to sanctify it, and then lit the new Paschal candle from the new fire. The Paschal candle represents Jesus, the light of the world. The Paschal candle has the cross imprinted on it, with the first and last letters of the Greek alphabet, the Alpha above the cross, and the Omega below it. It is Christ’s candle since, as the Book of Revelation says, “He is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.” The four numerals of this year, 2026, are inscribed around the cross. Why? Because Jesus is not only the beginning and the end; He is present in time now and at all times. As the Letter to the Hebrews says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.” As I said when I traced the four numerals of this year on the candle: “All time belongs to Him and all the ages. To Him be glory and power through every age and forever.” Joe Romie In Jesus Christ, time and eternity come together. God exists outside of time, but in becoming man, He entered our human experience of time and space. In Jesus, eternity is made present to us through His humanity. Time and space are lifted up into God’s eternity. As Deacon Johnathon sang in the Exsultet, “O truly blessed night, when things of heaven are wed to those of earth, and divine to the human.” The words and saving acts of Jesus that happened 2,000 years ago in Jerusalem are not just events of the past. Because of the union of time and eternity, these events are now always present, including His death and resurrection. Jesus is not distant and far away from us. He is always and everywhere applying the fruits of His Paschal Mystery to a world in need of salvation. And this happens through the sacramental life of the Church, the means by which we have access to these saving realities. Tonight, those who will receive the sacraments of Christian initiation will participate in and receive the fruits of Christ’s saving action. Joe Romie Those being baptized tonight will be immersed into the very life of Jesus and become Christians. They will really participate in Jesus’ death and resurrection through the waters of baptism. As St. Paul wrote in his Letter to the Romans: “Are you unaware that we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into His death? We were indeed buried with Him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might live in newness of life.” We who are baptized have received this new life in Christ, and we rejoice that five people will receive this new life through baptism tonight and become our brothers and sisters in Christ. They will become members of the Body of Christ, the Church. They will emerge from the baptismal font as new Christians. They are called, like all of us, to live this new life. To be a Christian is to live in Christ, to live in His light, to live the grace we receive in baptism, and to grow in the likeness of Christ throughout our lives – that is, to grow in holiness. Joe Romie Six Christians will be received into full communion in the Catholic Church tonight. Together with the newly baptized, they will receive the Sacrament of Confirmation. And eight young parishioners of the Cathedral Parish will also be confirmed. Confirmation is intimately connected to baptism – it confirms baptism. In other words, it amplifies or intensifies what took place at baptism. It incorporates us more firmly into Christ and strengthens our bond to the Church, associating us more closely with the Church’s mission. The Holy Spirit conferred at confirmation helps us to bear witness to our Christian faith in our words and deeds. In a mysterious way, what happened to the apostles at Pentecost happens to us at confirmation. The high point of the Easter Vigil is the celebration of the holy Eucharist, which is the completion of Christian initiation. Our 11 newly confirmed Catholics will receive their first holy Communion tonight. The Eucharist is the heart of the Church. All the sacraments mediate to us the fruits of the Paschal Mystery, but in the Eucharist, we receive our participation in the Paschal Mystery most perfectly. It is in an outstanding way the sacrament of the Paschal Mystery. All the sacraments flow from and lead back to the Eucharist since “in the blessed Eucharist is contained … Christ Himself, our Passover;” “the living bread come down from heaven.” The Eucharist “preserves, increases, and renews the life of grace received at baptism” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 1392). We need the nourishment of the Eucharist for our growth in the Christian life, the bread for our pilgrimage to the promised land until the moment of our death. Joe Romie We sing a lot of alleluias on this night of Our Lord’s resurrection. We sing alleluia because Jesus was victorious over sin and death. We sing alleluia because by His cross and resurrection, Jesus has set us free. We sing alleluia because Christ’s resurrection is not just a past event but happens here and now, because we can enter into the resurrection of Jesus and receive His new life in the sacraments. We sing alleluia because Jesus is alive and is always with us with His love, the love that is stronger than death! And we sing alleluia because He has prepared a place for us in His Father’s house with all the saints in glory! Joe Romie The post Bishop Rhoades at the Easter Vigil: ‘We Sing Alleluia Because Jesus Is Alive’ appeared first on Today's Catholic. ...read more read less