Easter Message of Archbishop Marco Tin Win of Mandalay Archdiocese

Easter Message 2025: “Hope Breaks the Tomb: The God Who Hears, Enters, and Raises Our Life”

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, beloved friends and partners in mission, Happy Easter! Alleluia!

Amid the ruins of earthquakes and the persistent violence of war, I write this Easter Message with a heart that is broken, but not without hope.

This year, as we celebrate the Jubilee 2025 with the theme “Pilgrims of Hope,” our Church in Myanmar continues its journey through immense sufferings.

Yet, even in these darkest valleys, we proclaim with confidence:

Christ is risen! He is truly risen!
Alleluia!

To the families living in displacement, to those sheltering under makeshift roofs, to the many
who grieve lost loved ones or long to return to their homes-your suffering is seen by God. In
the book of Exodus, God speaks to Moses, saying:

“I have seen the misery of my people … I have heard their cry … I am concerned about their
suffering … and I have come down to rescue them.” (Exodus 3:7- 8)

This is the God we worship: a God who sees, hears, comes down, and raises up.
And this God has come to us in the person of Jesus Christ-who did not remain distant from
human suffering, but entered fully into it.

On Good Friday, Jesus too cried out:
“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46)
But Easter reveals the deeper truth: the Father never abandoned the Son, and God never
abandons His people.

For the people of Myanmar, Lent has become a year-round experience. The suffering caused
by armed conflict, displacement, and now natural disasters like the recent earthquake has brought immense pain. Families are torn apart, children’s education is interrupted, and entire
communities are living in uncertainty.

As your shepherd, I too carry this sorrow. My heart aches for the pain of my people. I speak today, not only to our local faithful, but also to you–our brothers and sisters around the world
who accompany us in prayer, solidarity, and compassion.

Let us ask with courage and love:
When will the guns fall silent?
When will we lay down arms and take up dialogue?

When will every citizen of Myanmar have the freedom and dignity to live in peace?

This is a plea for reconciliation-not a call for passivity, but for conversion of hearts. Let us
correct past wrongs, forgive one another, and commit to building a just peace. Let us restore
hope for our children and heal the wounds of our land.

ကျွနု်ပ်တို့ သင်တို့အားလုံးကို တောင်းဆိုလိုပါတယ်။ ကျွနု်ပ်တောင်းဆိုလိုတာကတော့ … “စစ်ပွဲတွေ ရပ်လိုက်ပါ။” “ဗုံးကျဲတာတွေ ရပ်လိုက်ပါ” “မီးရှို့တာတွေ ရပ်လိုက်ပါ။” “သတ်ဖြတ်တာတွေ ရပ်လိုက်ပါ။” “စားပွဲမှာ ထိုင်ပြီး ဆွေးနွေးညှိနုှိင်းကြပါစို့။” “အချင်းချင်း နားထောင်ဖို့ စတင်ကြရအောင်။” အဲ့ဒါပြီးရင် … “တိုင်းပြည်ကို ချစ်တဲ့စိတ်နဲ့ ရိုးသားစွာ ဆွေးနွေးကြပါစို့။” ကျွနု်ပ်တို့ကလည်း တိုင်းပြည်ကို ချစ်တဲ့စိတ်နဲ့ တောင်းဆိုလိုတာကတော့ ….. “ငြိမ်းချမ်းရေး လိုအပ်နေပါတယ်။”

Yet Easter does not allow us to remain in despair.
The stone at the tomb was not only rolled away-it was shattered.

By His Resurrection, Jesus says to the suffering, to the grieving, to the weary:
“Rise.”

To those who feel silenced and forgotten, He assures us:

“Even if a mother forgets her child, I will not forget you.” (Isaiah 49: 15)
“He will wipe away every tear.” (Isaiah 25 :8)
“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God and in Me.” (John 14: I)

In this season of Easter, let us-together–continue to be witnesses of hope.
Let us accompany those who are displaced, advocate for the voiceless, and rebuild lives with
faith and resilience.

Let us roll away the stone of despair and make room for the Risen Christ, who lives among His
people.

May this Easter bring strength to the weary, courage to the fearful, and renewed faith to all.

Thank you to all our partners and donors who have stood with us. Your support is not only material-it is a sign of resurrection hope.

From the heart of Myanmar, with the Risen Christ at our side,
I bless you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Christ is risen! He is truly risen! Alleluia!