April 27, 2025
When it was evening on
that day, the first day of the week, and the doors were locked where the
disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said,
"Peace be with you."
After he said this, he
showed them his hands and his side. Then the disciples rejoiced when they saw
the Lord.
Jesus said to them again,
"Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you."
When he had said this, he
breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit.
If you forgive the sins
of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are
retained."
But Thomas (who was
called the Twin), one of the twelve, was not with them when Jesus came.
So the other disciples
told him, "We have seen the Lord." But he said to them, "Unless
I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger in the mark of the
nails and my hand in his side, I will not believe."
A week later his
disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors
were shut, Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with
you."
Then he said to Thomas,
"Put your finger here and see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in
my side. Do not doubt but believe."
Thomas answered him,
"My Lord and my God!"
Jesus said to him,
"Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have
not seen and yet have come to believe."
Now Jesus did many other
signs in the presence of his disciples that are not written in this book.
But these are written so
that you may continue to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and
that through believing you may have life in his name.
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I’ve been thinking about things that
I have not seen, yet believe.
I’m not talking about mythical
creatures that used to fill the edges of maps and still show up in fantasy
novels or medieval adventure tales – things like dragons or hobbits or unicorns
or flying spaghetti monsters. I’m not
talking about places like Middle Earth or Westeross or Utopia. I’m not talking about Q-Anon or Rosicrucians
or Plan B from Outer Space.
I’m thinking primarily of those
aspects of human life that are fragile and that are beaten down or bulldozed
all the time: of hopes and dreams and ideals and virtues and wonder, of trust
and friendship and love and kindness, of mercy and peace, of swords being
beaten into plowshares and people dwelling contentedly under their own vine and
their own fig tree. I’m thinking of all
of that high-minded, unrealistic stuff – anything that a cynic scoffs at,
knowing how a person is likely to be disappointed about such dreams in the long
run. And isn’t it better to have no
illusions to lose?
There
are hundreds of serious disappointments in any life. Have you ever read the Old Testament book of
Ecclesiastes? The writer goes back and
forth – sometimes talking about God’s understanding being deeper than ours and
how we should just do right and trust God but at other times talking about how
empty life can be while waiting for God (as he sees it) to hold up his end of
things.
“Vanity
of vanities, says the Teacher,
vanity
of vanities! All is vanity.
What do
people gain from all the toil
at
which they toil under the sun?
A
generation goes, and a generation comes,
but
the earth remains forever.
The sun
rises and the sun goes down,
and
hurries to the place where it rises.
The
wind blows to the south,
and
goes around to the north;
round
and round goes the wind,
and
on its circuits the wind returns.
All
streams run to the sea,
but
the sea is not full;
to the
place where the streams flow,
there
they continue to flow.
All
things are wearisome; more than one can express;
the
eye is not satisfied with seeing
or
the ear filled with hearing.
What
has been is what will be,
and
what has been done is what will be done;
there
is nothing new under the sun.” [Ecclesiastes 1:1-9]
Add to
that the way that sometimes the wicked prosper and the good suffer, and sometimes
the answer to prayer is, “Not right now,” or, “No.” What you have is a brutally honest
presentation of why a believer – even a disciple who had traveled with Jesus
himself – might hear the women’s account of the empty tomb and the other
disciples’ announcement that they had seen the Lord and say,
"Unless I see the mark of the nails
in his hands and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in his
side, I will not believe." [John 20:25]
So,
“A week later his disciples were again in
the house, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were shut, Jesus came
and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’
Then he said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here and see
my hands. Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt but
believe.’” [John 20:26-27]
We don’t
always, or don’t often, or maybe never get that direct kind of confirmation. But Jesus knew what Thomas needed to drag him
out of the sort of cynicism or bitterness that can grab somebody like quicksand
and drag them under. He tossed him a
lifeline.
“Thomas answered him, ‘My Lord and my God!’”
[John 20:28]
Thomas,
like the rest of the people who had closed themselves inside a locked room out
of fear, was being set free to live, as Jesus had been set free from the tomb.
And we all have the same opportunity
that Thomas had (and made the best of) to take that incredibly good news to
heart and to pass it on. Whether it
comes to us directly or indirectly, the news that Jesus is alive and active and
filling his followers with his Spirit is just what is needed.
“Have
you believed because you have seen me?”
Jesus
asked Thomas.
“Blessed
are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.” [John 20:29]
That
good news has real power to set people free from fear, from despair, from what the
old hymn calls, “weak resignation to the evils we despise.” That good news is the news that our wounds
will not finish us off because
“by his
bruises we are healed.” [Isaiah
53:5]
We
do not have to lose heart even when we are hemmed in by the worst that the
world can do.
Jorge Borgoglio, a former chemist
from Argentina, somebody who in the prime of his life saw colleagues in his
second career as a priest “disappeared” by a military dictatorship, wrote an
Easter message just over a week ago, and put it this way:
“In the
Lord’s Paschal Mystery, death and life contended in a stupendous struggle, but
the Lord now lives forever. He fills us
with the certainty that we too are called to share in the life that knows no
end, when the clash of arms and the rumble of death will be heard no more. Let
us entrust ourselves to him, for he alone can make all things new.”[1]
And, I would
add, he does.
[1]
Pope Francis, “Urbi et Orbi” Message, April 20, 2025 (Rome: Dicastero per la
Comunicazione - Libreria Editrice Vaticana).
Found at https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/messages/urbi/documents/20250420-urbi-et-orbi-pasqua.html
.
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