2nd Sunday of Easter, Year A
How many of us are surprised by Thomas’s action in doubting the resurrection of Jesus Christ? I am not, because I do the same thing and worse with my sins. We should not be surprised because, we doubt God almost everyday. Yes we do, we doubt Him when we fail to live out His gospel in the world, and when we sin. We live in a world that lives by and accepts the notion that “Seeing is believing,” as stated by Thomas Fuller, an English churchman, historian, author and writer.
As human beings, experience has taught us that it is difficult to believe in someone or something we can’t see. Even some people who experience miraculous things, or are close to holy people, still do not believe! Remember, many of the Jews who lived in Jesus’s time and even with Him, never believed in Him. Some of His own apostles and disciples like Thomas as we heard in today’s gospel reading, did not fully believe that He has risen from the dead, or that has the power to do so. Why is this the case? Our lack of belief in God is rooted in our lack of faith in Him or how shaky our faith is in Him.
Remember what Faith means, Faith according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church is “the theological virtue by which we believe in God and believe all that He has said and revealed to us, and that Holy Church proposes for our belief, because He is truth itself. By faith, man freely commits his entire self to God.” Hence, faith is the root of all virtues. Faith is given us in Baptism with God’s sanctifying grace, and it continues to grow in us as we mature, and learn about God as He teaches us in the Catholic Church. Faith doesn’t depend on seeing, rather on believing. Faith also does not depend on understanding, because it is centered on God’s love for us, and is a gift from Him. According to Saint Augustine, “Faith is to believe what you do not see; (but) the reward of this faith is to see what you believe.” So, how strong is your faith in God? Do you truly believe in God or do you need more proof to do so like Thomas needed?
As we celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday today, we are reminded of God’s blessings, graces and mercies upon us, and that we are called to deepen our faith in Him, manifest our faith in Him, and profess that faith in our world today. This was why Jesus confronted Thomas with these words, “Put your finger here and see my hands, and bring your hand and put it into my side, and do not be unbelieving, but believe…. Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” So let us deepen our faith in God by following the example of Thomas who accepted his faults, changed his life and professed and witnessed to Christ even to the extent of dying as a martyr for the gospel.
My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, like Thomas, who exclaimed, “my Lord and my God,” by acknowledging his sin of unbelief, changed his life, and later spent his life in service to God and died a martyr professing his faith in Christ; let us appreciate God’s love for us, and His mercies upon us through Jesus Christ, by deepening our faith in Him, and by professing and manifesting that faith in thought, word and action in our world today.
