“The enemies of Our Blessed Lord were too optimistic on Good Friday.  He said that He would ‘destroy the Temple, and then rebuild it.’ But the Temple was still standing.  ‘He saved others, but now could not save Himself.’  He said He was a King, but He was proven to be a mock King with a crown of thorns for a diadem, a nail for a scepter, a crucifixion for a coronation.  Joseph of Arimathea boldly goes to Pilate to ask for the body of Our Lord.  The Greek word which the Gospel says Joseph used was Soma, which is the word of respect for a body.  Pilate was too optimistic and he told Joseph that he would give him not the soma, but the proma, which means cadaver or rubbish.  The final optimism of the enemies was the setting of the guards, not to prevent the Resurrection, but to prevent the apostles from stealing the body.  Finally, they rolled a great stone in front of His tomb.  He who had called Himself ‘the Rock’ is now rockbound in a tomb.  On the other hand, the friends of Our Lord were too pessimistic and despairing.  The women go to the grave on Easter morning with spices which they had prepared, not to greet a Risen Lord, but to anoint a dead body.  When Magdalene finds the tomb empty, instead of believing that He has risen, she says to the Angel who asks her why she weeps, ‘because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid Him.’  She runs to tell Peter and John saying, ‘I have seen the Lord.’  But they, hearing it, do not believe it, saying it is a woman’s tale.”  Archbishop Fulton Sheen (Lenten and Easter Inspirations)