On
April 30th of the year 2000, two important things happened that have
directly affected our celebration today.
(Perhaps many of you know what these things are, but we’ll review them
here, just to be sure.) First, Pope John
Paul II canonized Sr. Maria Faustina Kowalska, a Polish nun who was blessed to
have received revelations from Jesus asking her to spread devotion to Divine
Mercy. Second, Pope John Paul II
declared that the second Sunday of Easter would be known from now on as “Divine
Mercy Sunday”. The first was important
as an authentication of the revelations made to Sr. Faustina, thus making it
possible to promote devotion to Divine Mercy throughout the whole world. The second was important as it fulfilled one
of the requests that Jesus made to Sr. Faustina: that is, that the entire
Church reserve the second Sunday of Easter to honor and commemorate God’s
infinite mercy. And so, today, it is
appropriate that we spend some time in this Mass reflecting on God’s mercy.
In
the Scriptures, we see God’s mercy on display.
In the Gospel, we rewind back to the day of the Resurrection, where the
disciples of Jesus had gathered together and did not yet know of Jesus’
resurrection. The risen Jesus then appears
before them, even though the doors to the place were locked—which was a display
of great and fearful power—and what does he say to them? Does he say, “How could you? You all abandoned me in my hour of need! Then, you huddle away in fear as if I never
told you that this is how it had to be!
It’s like you weren’t even listening!”
No, he doesn’t say that, does he?
What does he say? He says, “Peace
be with you” and he makes himself available to them: showing them his hands and
his side so that they will know it’s him in the flesh and not a ghost. He didn’t chastise them; rather, he had mercy
on them, even though they had abandoned him.
Not
only that, but Jesus’ next move is to give them a commission to go and share
this joyful message with others. Notice
that this commission, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you”, has no limits
on it. Thus Jesus is extending his mercy
even to those who put him to death as he sends his disciples to proclaim that
he is risen and that redemption can be enjoyed by all who put their faith in
him.
To
be sure that there is no doubt about whether or not a person has received God’s
mercy, Jesus does something even more incredible: he gives his disciples the
authority to forgive sins. Therefore,
whenever they encounter anyone, they don’t have to rely on a vague conviction (“God
is merciful, and so I’m sure that God forgives you”), but rather they can
boldly proclaim: “I know that God
forgives you, because I have been given the authority to proclaim his
forgiveness, and I proclaim it”. This,
of course, is the institution of the Sacrament of Reconciliation: the sacrament
of God’s mercy extended to sinners.
Then,
in spite of all of this heightened drama, there comes a moment of even greater drama
in today’s reading, doesn’t there?
Thomas, one of Jesus’ twelve closest disciples, wasn’t with them when
Jesus appeared to them on that first Easter evening. When he returns to them and they tell him
that they had seen Jesus alive, Thomas denies it. (Can you imagine it? Thomas hearing the account of Jesus’ appearance
and saying, “No! I don’t believe it! You’re lying and being hurtful to me!”) He is so hurt by the seeming defeat of
Jesus—the one who he thought would be his new king—that he will not accept the
testimony of others, but rather instead insists on a face-to-face
reconciliation with him.
For
a whole week Thomas broods over the fact that Jesus allegedly appeared to the
other disciples without him being present until the following Sunday when,
present this time with the other disciples, Thomas, too, sees the risen
Lord. Again, mercifully, Jesus does not condemn Thomas, but rather he invites
him close. In a way, Jesus is saying to
him, “Do not let your hurt get in the way of placing your faith in me. Come, touch the nail marks and my open side
and know that it is me, alive even after death!” Thomas, having come face to face with the man
who was dead, but now lives, confesses the truth that his heart surely knew all
along: “My Lord and my God!” ///
This,
my brothers and sisters, is the unbounded nature of God’s mercy: not just that
he would forgive us our sins, but rather that he would come close to us, never
allowing us to stay far from him, but rather pursuing us because he desires so
much that we would be reconciled to him.
I mean, do you think that it was an accident that Jesus appeared to the
disciples when Thomas wasn’t with
them on Easter Sunday? Of course
not! In doing so, Jesus wanted to prove
to us that, even in our doubt, he would not abandon us. Thus, he allows Thomas to miss his first
appearance so that he might show us all that doubt—even if it is significant!—is
not enough to scare him away or offend him. [REPEAT] Rather, he comes to us
again… and again… and again, if necessary, until we allow his tender gaze to
fall upon us and so confess our faith in him.
Each
of us, I’m sure, has experienced the kinds of anxieties, frustrations, and
doubts that Thomas experienced when he watched his Lord suffer and die. I suspect that it is safe to say that, at
some point in our lives, each of us, like Thomas, has resisted believing that
God really has overcome what seemed to be our defeat. What this Gospel reading today does for us—and
what our commemoration of Divine Mercy today does for us—is remind us that God
never abandons us in our anxieties, frustrations, and doubts, but that he comes
back to us, ever ready to meet us, hands exposed and saying “Peace be with
you.” It is peace that he offers us: the
peace of believing that God’s goodness can never be exhausted and that no
darkness in the world can ever extinguish his light: the very light that broke
through the darkness of death so that we might experience eternal life.
Every
time that we come to Mass and we approach Holy Communion, we come face-to-face
once again with God’s mercy. Today, on
the day in which we particularly celebrate the Divine Mercy, let’s open our
hearts to allow Jesus’ words to be spoken into our lives once again: “Peace be
with you.” And then, as our “Amen”
proclaims the words of St. Thomas—“My Lord and my God!”—let us also speak the
words that Jesus taught St. Maria Faustina to say when she was face-to-face
with his mercy: “Jesus, I trust in you.”
With these words in our hearts, we will then be ready to step forward from
this Mass to be the face of God’s mercy to those around us; so that, together, we
might proclaim the most important truth of them all: that Jesus, the Son of
God, the crucified one, is alive… that he is truly risen!
Given at St. Joan of Arc Parish: Kokomo, IN – April 6th,
2024
Given at the Monastery of the Poor Clares: Kokomo, IN – April
7th, 2024
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