04 18 25 KOA’s Rob Dawson Talks Easter w St John's Cathedral Dean Rev Richard Lawson

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
It is Colorado's morning news.

Speaker 2 (00:01):
Christians all across the state in the world getting ready
for one of the most holy days in the Christian calendar.

Speaker 3 (00:06):
Easter Sunday fast approaching and hey always Rob Dawson went
to Saint John's Cathedral in Denver, Marty, Chad. Saint John's
is the flagship church of the Episcopal diocese in the state,
and all the staff there I were busy inside getting
ready for the big day when I visited. So I
talked to cathedral Dean, the very Reverend Richard Lawson in
the chapel this year with this year's Eastern Message. We

(00:28):
were just talking that you look so much forward to
Holy Week and then the culmination of Easter Sunday. What's
so special ever here?

Speaker 1 (00:35):
No, I mean it's incredible. I mean it's so many things.

Speaker 2 (00:38):
But if I just to tell you the first thing
that comes to mind for us at the cathedral, you've
got all of your ordinary members.

Speaker 1 (00:48):
Who come from week to week.

Speaker 2 (00:50):
The thing, You've got so many guests, so many friends,
so many family members that belonged to those families that
belonged to the cathedral. So the circle just gets big
and bigger and bigger and bigger, and as somebody who
gives communion to people, as somebody who's preaching the gospel
and the resurrection. Hope, you're just imagining a much larger
community than you normally are, you know, on Sunday by Sunday,

(01:14):
and there's something both challenging and fun and wonderful about that.

Speaker 3 (01:18):
And the Episcopal faith. The story of Easter is the
same but has different nuances that similar to Christmas. Right there,
is there anything this year that you're thinking about?

Speaker 2 (01:27):
Yeah? No, for sure, So we're going to be Our
gospel story on Sunday is John chapter twenty.

Speaker 1 (01:35):
It's when maybe Magdalene goes to the tomb.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
She she mistakes this mysterious stranger for being a gardener
because there's a garden nearby, so she thinks she's talking
to a gardener, and it turns out that the gardener
is none other than the risen Christ whom she's seeking.
What I'm working with is a lot of themes, but
the one I'm going to end with this year, at

(01:59):
least plaining to you right now is Jesus ultimately says
to her, do not cling to me, don't grasp me,
for I've not yet ascended to God the Father, and
so Jesus is counseling her to let go a little bit.
But I actually find some degree of hope in it,
because I think what Christ is inviting her to do

(02:21):
is to trust that God and the Spirit is going
to be with her in a new future, and not
to cling to what was, but to really have this profound, spiritual.

Speaker 1 (02:38):
Openness to what is to come. And so I think
it's ultimately a.

Speaker 2 (02:43):
Message about hope and a deep trust that God is
with us, not just in the past and not just
right now, but even tomorrow morning.

Speaker 3 (02:53):
And daily life. It's tough sometimes we do.

Speaker 2 (02:55):
Claim right, yeah, yeah, no, for sure, you know these
are these are hard days. You and I had this
conversation a year ago, and they were hard days. Then.
I would never say that one year is worse or
even silly better than the previous year. But the things
that I'm so aware of right now is, regardless of

(03:16):
how anyone voted, clearly we're in a position of mass
debate and confusion and conflict in our country over deeply
held and cherished values and deeply held and people clinging
to their own beliefs and contrast to someone.

Speaker 3 (03:36):
Else's you know, those are people that are following the
works of God and Jesus.

Speaker 1 (03:41):
Sorry, no, I've got a lot of hope.

Speaker 2 (03:44):
I think that, you know, God is as real and
as active right now as God has ever been. So
in the midst of all of the pain and the
trauma and the wars and the crises, you know, I
don't fall into despair. I tried to be open eyed
and see reality for what it is. But I think

(04:04):
a huge piece of reality right now is also God's presence.

Speaker 3 (04:09):
I'm always just so fascinated that Easter is different because
it revives around the moon, right, yeah, and this is
later this year late, yeah, and that thing it almost
feels like you got to work for it.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
Yeah, you got to wait for it so that that, yeah,
exactly Easter is. You know, it's it's it's tied to
the miraculous event of christ resurrection, but through Christian history
it's also tied in terms of the dating of it too.
It has to occur in spring after the first full moon,

(04:42):
and many of us in Denver have seen that full
moon finally emerge about a week or so ago, and
so it is tied to this natural event, and there's
a kind of beauty to that anything else.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
No, just just again.

Speaker 2 (04:58):
I know I said it, I said it last year,
but God bless you and your work at iHeartRadio. I
really appreciate a good journalism that tries to tell real
stories about about what we face as human beings. And
so thank you for the time, thank you for your
good questions.