Joh 20:19-31
Acts 2:42-47
1 Pet 1:3-9
focus: The Risen Christ is our Lord and God.
function: The Easter Season is meant to help us believe in the resurrection.
We have celebrated Easter; and the feast continues for fifty days! On Easter Sunday after the vigil, I was energized and full of joy: the light of the Easter candle was multiplied and this chapel was beautifully illuminated by many little lights that we had lit from the Easter candle and carried with us. The wonderful Easter Proclamation, the Exsultet followed; then the many Alleluias and the renewal of our baptismal vows.
Everyday life with its ups and downs goes on after Easter Sunday, however, and we live in this same world. The purpose of the Easter Season, of us celebrating 50 days of Easter, is to train our eyes, so they become as it were Easter eyes, so they learn to see the new reality of the Resurrection more and more in our own lives and in our world.
In both the gospels of Easter Sunday and of today the Resurrection Event is surrounded by contrasts: a sense of great loss // and great joy; doubt // and belief. Today’s gospel begins by pointing out that the disciples were gathered behind locked doors “for fear.”
Jesus’ death had driven them into hiding. Then the Risen One stands in their midst and suddenly, as they see Him, they are full of joy.
What caused their Easter joy? Certainly, Jesus’ presence, Jesus’ being alive. And then also Jesus’ message. He speaks words of peace and forgiveness. Peace (Greek eirene) here doesn’t mean only the absence of war. Behind it we can hear the Hebrew concept of shalom, which means universal well-being and wholeness.
A prerequisite of this shalom’s, this peace’ full reception is the forgiveness of sins: the disciples need to receive forgiveness from God, and they are called upon to extend forgiveness to other people. Peace and forgiveness together open up new spaciousness, the space of salvation, shattering the confines of locked doors and doubt.
Thomas, who was absent during this first encounter with the risen Lord, doesn’t believe the witness of the other disciples. Like us, he wants tangible evidence. Before he actually touches Jesus though Thomas only utters a profound profession of faith: “My Lord and my God!” His encounter with the risen Lord replaces the need for to touch and opens up space for faith and for salvation. Thomas experienced the peace and the forgiveness that Jesus, the Risen One, offers!
Dear sisters and brothers in faith, The Risen Christ is our Lord and God. The Easter Season is meant to help us believe in the Resurrection. We also can experience Christ’s presence and in concrete ways see him and touch him! The report about the life in the early Jerusalem Christian community in today’s first reading gives us pointers as to how this can happen. It describes various elements of the early Christian’s life together.
The center is the Eucharist, the “breaking of the bread.” In the Eucharist, Jesus shows us, as it were, his hands and his side. We commemorate his passion and death. At the Eucharist, he bestows the Holy Spirit upon us. In the Epiclesis, we call down the Holy Spirit upon bread and wine. After the consecration, at Communion, we touch Him, we eat him into ourselves, so that he can transform us, so that our hearts become more and more like his.
Then there is the teaching of the apostles. During the Easter Season, the Lectionary presents us with sections from the Acts of the Apostles; We hear how, in spite of rejection and persecution, the message about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus spreads over the whole world known at this time. The teaching of the apostles came so evidently from God! Humans were not able to destroy it.
Finally, there is the communal life. We encounter the Risen Christ in each other. Our ability to forgive a person who has hurt us is a gift of the Risen One; we receive it if we ask him for it. Our ability to share our possessions with those who are in need—according to the example of the early Christians in Jerusalem—is a gift of the Risen Lord, too, and evidence of His presence within us and around us.
Certainly, it would be nice to trade places with Thomas and to share in this first, overwhelming experience of Christ’s resurrection. If we, however, in a prayerful attitude, see and hear, note and perceive, especially during the next six weeks, we will, despite and in the midst of all that worries us and tries our faith, get in touch ever more fully with this new reality; indeed, we, too, will encounter and touch the Risen One.
Amen. Shalom!