On the third day he rose from the dead.
“We bring you the good news that what God promised to the fathers, he has fulfilled for us their children by raising Jesus” (Acts 13:32-33).
The Resurrection of Jesus is the crowning truth of our faith in Christ. The first Christian community believed and lived it as the central truth, Tradition handed it on as fundamental, the documents of the New Testament established it, and it was preached, together with the Cross, as an essential part of the Paschal mystery: “Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down death by death, and upon those in the tombs bestowing life.”
The historical and transcendent event
The mystery of Christ’s Resurrection is a real event, with manifestations that were historically verified, as the New Testament bears witness.
Around AD 56, Saint Paul could already write to the Corinthians: “I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve” (1 Cor 15:3-5).
Here the Apostle speaks of the living tradition of the Resurrection which he had learned after his conversion at the gates of Damascus.
Catechism of the Catholic Church, nos. 638-639
