SECOND SUNDAY OF EASTER
16 APRIL 2023
The
Gospel of Saint John equates seeing with believing. John the Baptists invites the crowds to see
him as the Christ when he declares after baptizing him: “Behold the Lamb of
God.” Those who see him as the Lamb of
God will understand his role as the Messiah giving his life out of love for
everyone. Jesus invites people to see
him as the Christ in each of his seven miracles or signs, beginning with
changing water into wine at the Wedding Feast of Cana. When the man born blind finally sees the one
who restored his sight, he believes and worships him. On the third day after his death on a cross,
his earliest followers see the empty tomb.
However, they do not believe until they see the risen Lord. Mary Magdalene recognizes him when he calls
him by name outside the empty tomb. She
sees, believes, and becomes the Apostle to the Apostles when she runs and
reports to them that she has seen the risen Lord. However, they do not believe her until the
risen Lord breaks through the locked doors of the room where they are cowering
in fear and guilt. Once they see him,
they believe.
However,
Thomas is not with them. The Gospel does
not tell us why he skipped that first Easter Sunday gathering. Perhaps guilt at abandoning the Lord in his
hour of need separates him from the other ten.
Maybe grief isolates him. When
they tell him that they have seen the risen Lord, he refuses to believe until
he can see for himself. On the following
Sunday, he rejoins the community and sees the risen Lord. He
sees the wounds, still present on the Lord’s Risen body, to show us that even
in our most wounded hours, the Risen Christ feels our pain as his own, is
present with us, and has conquered the world. He sees, believes, and makes the most
profound statement of faith in the New Testament: “My Lord and my God.”
Jesus calls
Thomas “blessed,” because he sees and believes.
But then he names us blessed, who believe without seeing as the earliest
disciples had seen. Beginning on Holy
Saturday when we celebrated the bright light of the risen Lord emerging from
the darkness of his tomb, we have celebrated his resurrection throughout this
Octave of Easter. Even though we have
not seen as they had seen, we believe their testimony and renew our faith that
Good Friday was not the end of the journey for Jesus of Nazareth. On this last day of the Octave of Easter, we
hear the same words addressed to the first disciples and accept his mercy and his
forgiveness for the times we may have abandoned him through our actions.
Saint John
Paul II is the Pope who designated this last day of the Octave of Easter Divine
as Mercy Sunday. He said this about
Easter: “We do not pretend that life is all beauty. We are aware of darkness and sin, of poverty
and pain. But we know Jesus has
conquered sin and passed through his own pain to the glory of the
Resurrection. And we live in the light
of his Paschal Mystery – the mystery of his death and resurrection. ‘We are an
Easter People and alleluia is our song!’ We are not looking for a shallow joy
but rather a joy that comes from faith, that grows through unselfish love, that
respects the ‘fundamental duty of love of neighbor, without which it would be
unbecoming to speak of Joy.’”
As a
parish, we can accept the Pope’s challenge to remain as Easter People, with alleluia
as our song. We can commit ourselves to
making our parish look like Saint Luke’s description of the earliest community
of believers in the Acts of the Apostles.
Like them, we must devote ourselves to the teaching of the apostles and
to the communal life, to the breaking of bread and to the prayers. As Easter people, we can be in solidarity
with the poor and those who need our help.
Perhaps more people might come to believe if they see the presence of
the risen Lord in our community of Easter People.
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