Category: Easter

Our Gospel for this Sunday (John 20: 19 -31) is remembered as the story of doubting Thomas — this in spite of the fact that Thomas makes the most resounding act of faith in Jesus in the whole Gospel of John. It should really be remembered as a story of faith — believing Thomas. But that will never catch on, simply because we identify more readily with the figure of doubt — just that bit nearer to our experience.

There is a painting by the celebrated 17th century Italian artist, Caravaggio which is titled “The Incredulity of St Thomas”. The painting was completed between 1601-1602. It is the most copied painting of Caravaggio, 22 copies from the 17th century are known. The painting represents visually what we have proclaimed in today’s Gospel, namely the invitation by Jesus to Thomas to “put your finger here and see.” In Caravaggio’s painting Thomas has the forefinger of his right hand inserted into the side of Jesus as far as the first knuckle joint! It is a dramatic presentation of today’s Gospel and invites a reflection on touch.

Touch speaks the wordless words of love and intimacy.  We receive so much touch when we are babies and so little when we are adults.  Our Holy Thursday liturgy has individuals touching another’s feet in the intimacy of foot washing. At the Good Friday liturgy, we are invited to venerate the Cross, and many come forward to touch the wood with hand or lips. Each time we gather to receive Holy Communion, we hold our hand and are touched with the Body of Christ.

And then standing in a crowded bus or train bodies jostle back and forward and touch with the movement of the vehicle.

Being human people, we are embodied, enfleshed, as Jesus was when “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us”. ( Jn 1: 14)

Touch has a vocabulary of its own. In friendship touch often gives more life than words.  A friend’s hand stroking our back, a friend’s arms resting on our shoulder, a friend’s fingers wiping our tears away, a friend’s lips kissing our forehead — these are true consolation.  Two lovers speaking their love through the intimate touch of the other’s body.

These moments of touch are truly sacred.  They restore, they reconcile, they reassure, they forgive, they heal.

John’s Gospel tells of a deep personal peace that comes when we are freed from fear and confusion. Jesus indicates this freedom as he asks Thomas to feel his wounds, dissolving Thomas’ fear and distrust by letting himself be touched so intimately.

Everyone who touched Jesus and everyone whom Jesus touched were healed.  God’s love and power went out from him (see Luke 6:19).   When a friend touches us with free, non-possessive love, God’s incarnate love touches us and God’s power heals us.

The illustration is of “The Incredulity of Saint Thomas”, 1601 – 02 , currently in the permanent collection of Sanssouci Picture Gallery, Potsdam, Germany.

We need to risk God’s mercy more. The place of justice and truth should never be ignored, but we must risk letting the infinite, unbounded, unconditional, undeserved mercy of God flow free. The mercy of God is as accessible as the nearest water tap, and so we, like Isaiah, must proclaim a mercy that has no price tag: “Come, come without money and without virtue, come everyone, drink freely of God’s mercy!”

What holds us back? Why are we so hesitant in proclaiming God’s inexhaustible, prodigal, indiscriminate mercy?

Partly our motives are good, noble even. Concern for truth, justice, orthodoxy, morality, proper public form, proper sacramental preparation, fear of scandal, and concern for the ecclesial community that needs to absorb and carry the effect of sin, these are not unimportant things. Love needs always to be tempered by truth, even as truth must ever be moderated by love. However, sometimes our motives are less noble and the hesitancy arises out of timidity, fear, jealousy, and legalism – the self-righteousness of the Pharisees or the bitter jealousy of the older brother of the prodigal son. No cheap grace is to be dispensed on our watch! God’s mercy, as Jesus revealed it, embraces indiscriminately, the bad with the good, the undeserving with the deserving, the uninitiated with the initiated. One of the truly startling insights that Jesus gave us is that the mercy of God cannot not go out to everyone. It is always free, undeserved, unconditional, universal in embrace, reaching beyond all religion, custom, rubric, political correctness, mandatory program, ideology, and even beyond sin itself.

The illustration I have found helpful over the years when contemplating the mercy of God, is that of a waterfall – the water somehow keeps tumbling over! This image is of Niagara Falls. The Falls span the border between the province of Ontario in Canada and the state of New York in the United States. Go near them and you will get wet – get near to God and you will be shown mercy!

In the third book of JRR Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy there is a scene that captures something of the joy experienced by the disciples when the resurrected Jesus appeared to them.

The realm of the Dark Lord, Sauron has been destroyed, and against all hope the world has been saved, at least for the time being.

Frodo, the hobbit, and his faithful servant and friend, Samwise, have also been saved. Sam wakes up, smells wonderful perfumes and sees Gandalf, the wizard he thought was dead. Sam gasps,

“Gandalf! I thought you were dead! But then I thought I was dead myself. Is everything sad going to come untrue?” “A great Shadow has departed,” said Gandalf, and then he laughed, and the sound was like music, or like water in a parched land; and as he listened the thought came to Sam that he had not heard laughter, the pure sound of merriment, for days upon days without count. It fell upon his ears like the echo of all the joys he had ever known. But he himself burst into tears. Then, as sweet rain will pass down a wind of spring and the sun will shine out the clearer, his tear ceased, and his laughter welled up, and laughing he sprang from his bed.

“How do you feel?” he cried. “Well, I don’t know how to say it. I feel, I feel” – he waved his arms in the air – “I feel like the spring after winter, and the sun on the leaves; and like trumpets and harps and all the songs I have ever heard!”

Initially, the resurrection didn’t make a big splash. It was not some spectacular event that exploded into the world as the highlight on the evening news. It had the same dynamics as the incarnation itself: After he rose from the dead, Jesus was seen by some, but not by others; understood by some, but not by others. Some got his meaning, and it changed their lives, others were indifferent to him, and still others understood what had happened, hardened their hearts against it, and tried to destroy its truth.

Notice how these parallels, almost perfectly, what happened at the birth of Jesus: The baby was real, not a ghost, but he was seen by some, but not by others and the event was understood by some but not by others. Some got its meaning, and it changed their lives, others were indifferent and their lives went on as before, while still others (like Herod) sensed its meaning but hardened their hearts against it and tried to destroy the child.

Why the difference? What makes some see the resurrection while others do not? What lets some understand the mystery and embrace it, while others are left in indifference or hatred?

The 12thC theologian, Hugo of St. Victor used to say: Love is the eye! When we look at anything through the eyes of love, we see correctly, understand, and properly appropriate its mystery. The reverse is also true. When we look at anything through eyes that are jaded, cynical, jealous, or bitter, we will not see correctly, will not understand, and will not properly appropriate its mystery.

We see this in how the Gospel of John describes the events of Easter Sunday. Jesus has risen, but first of all, only the person who is driven by love, Mary Magdala, goes out in search of him. The others remain as they are, locked inside their own worlds. But love seeks out its beloved and Mary Magdala goes out, spices in hand, wanting at least to embalm his dead body. She finds his grave empty and runs back to Peter and the beloved disciple and tells them the tomb is empty. The two race off together, towards the tomb, but the disciple whom Jesus loved out-runs Peter and gets to the tomb first, but he doesn’t enter, he waits for Peter (authority) to go in first.

Peter enters the empty tomb, sees the linens that had covered the body of Jesus, but does not understand. Then the beloved disciple, love, enters. He sees and he does understand. Love grasps the mystery. Love is the eye. It is what lets us see and understand the resurrection.

Like the pebble falling into a still pond, so to does the resurrection of Jesus effect its works.