It’s astonishing how pertinent this present time is to that of the first Easter 2,000-plus years ago — when dread permeated the land following the Crucifixion of Him who brought hope and peace to so many. The idea that this was the start and not the end of something wonderful eluded most people. They quaked in fear until the full scope of the miracle gradually spread. For all the glory witnessed on the Third Day — that empty tomb on Easter Sunday — and worshipped every year since, the eternal influence of the Resurrection leapt forward two days later with an encounter on the road to Emmaus:

Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem. They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them. Luke 24: 13-15. This occurrence, amid the widespread dread surrounding it, is beautifully depicted in a major Hollywood miniseries from 1985, which seems as remote from modern Hollywoke fare as the actual Anno Domini.

Christ’s post-execution appearance to his followers reinvigorated the faith that would sustain them and the Church through the darkness yet to come, most notably their persecution by the mightiest force on Earth — the Roman Empire. Around 60 A.D., the emperor Nero — to distract the populace from his decadence, corruption, and mismanagement — at first vilified then slaughtered and enslaved Christians while entertaining his subjects with “breads and circuses,” state-sanctioned freak shows. So today does the perverse, malignant Left controlling Rome’s modern day equal, the United States, follow the Nero regime’s history of victimizing Christians while celebrating the demonic.

And nothing better fits that description than Transgenderism. Christianity aside, it is easier to accept that a man once rose from the dead than any man can become a woman, or vice-versa. Yet from the embracement of this very fantasy, an entire ridiculous though hateful, violent, oppressive movement has sprung, with the endorsement and enforcement of the ruling party, and the desiccated cretin at the head. Like the Ancient Roman leaders, they’ve unleashed this evil on the pious.

But unlike the original clash of religion versus paganism that marked the original conflict — which the former ultimately won by filling the vacuum of the latter with the word of God to build Western civilization — the current battle is between a weakened Christianity and a sick, brutal, bloodthirsty cult. Christianity is weaker now because darkness has infiltrated and diminished it. Hence, leaders most damaging to it — such as Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Barack Obama, “Reverend” Ralph Warnock, countless woke clergy — pretend allegiance to it while promoting behavior anathema to it: abortion, sexual perversion, transgenderism.

Last month, a woman claiming to be “transgender” shot up a Christian school in Nashville, slaughtering three little children and three adults. Any true faith leader would have, if not outright condemned the killer, eulogized her victims. Instead, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre Thursday, speaking for the President, praised adherents of the ideology that inspired the Nashville murderess, inferring animosity to it from the religion of the dead. “LGBTQI-plus kids are resilient,” Jean-Pierre said. “They are fierce. They fight back. They’re not going anywhe re. And we have their back. This administration has their back.”

“They are fierce. They fight back.” Eviler words have seldom been spoken in the wake of the Nashville infamy. The White House “blessing” may encourage more anti-Christian violence like from the killer girl. A “transgender” teen boy was arrested just about a week ago in Colorado for planning a massacre at his old middle school and some churches.

The Lutheran pastor of a “transgender”-friendly church in Fargo, North Dakota, put her progressive politics above the Christian dead in Nashville during her Palm Sunday sermon. “Instead of focusing on ways this could have been prevented, such as gun control, a significant number of people have turned their attention toward the shooter’s identity,” lamented the woman.

I have personally witnessed the diabolism of the “transgender” cult. A friend and neighbor that I walk to Mass with every weekend, when talking about his family, now unflinchingly mentions his granddaughter. I know he has only one grandson. By some alchemic mystery, a boy — and his entire boyhood — appears to have completely vanished from existence. And his grandfather accepts this, with what inner sadness, I can only imagine.

So, evil surrounds us Christians this Easter as it did those on the first one. Our ruling elite hates us just as much as theirs did them. We need look no further than a leaked FBI document last February revealing a Bureau investigation into “radical traditional” Catholic ties to the “far-right white nationalist movement.” The corrupt Biden Justice Department’s pathetic attempt to racialize Catholics in order to damage them won’t work as long as notable black Christians like Jason Whitlock, Candace Owen, Ben Carson , and many others stand with them.

Whitlock addressed the Nashville horror more spiritually and righteously than any government official. “It is another sad case of a culture that preaches to kids that they can find freedom in their sexual identity or their race rather than preaching that only obedience to God can grant true freedom,” Whitlock said.

We Christians must follow the road through the darkness. And if a fellow traveler should join us on the road this Easter, so much the better.