Today’s Gospel tells the familiar story of doubting Thomas. To me it is understandable that Thomas had doubts. He doubted the other disciples. He doubted himself. And he doubted the Lord. This changed when he saw the risen Lord. Upon seeing him, Thomas’ response was, “My Lord and My God.” Jesus’ next comment was meant for us, “You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.”
There are times when we too have doubts in our faith. That is part of being human. Faith asks us to take a step, a leap actually, away from all that we can see, hear and sense, a step away from the limits of our rational capabilities and a step into mystery. Doubts in faith are normal. It takes courage and determination to say, “I still believe, Lord. I believe in your Word. I believe that your Son became one of us as the Bible said He would. I believe that His sacrificial love on the cross earned for us the gift of new life. I believe that no matter what my eyes see or don’t see, my ears hear or don’t hear, no matter what my mind can determine or what its limits are, you are still there for me, loving me, filling me with a joy that doesn’t go away.”
In His Mercy, God sees us as we are, human beings with doubts, but also people who have experienced His Love and want more of it. We might feel bad about ourselves for having doubts, but His Divine Mercy is so great that God sees us not as people with doubts, but as people who are searching for Him. That’s why Divine Mercy Sunday fits so well with the Gospel passage of doubting Thomas, ordinary people like you and me called to have extraordinary faith.
Pope John Paul II was really an ordinary man called to have extraordinary faith. Since the early years of his priesthood,he had a deep devotion to the Divine Mercy. In the year 2000 he officially established the Sunday after Easter as Divine Mercy Sunday. On that same date he canonized a humble Polish nun named Faustina Kowalska.
Sr. Faustina served as a cook, gardener, and doorkeeper. The sisters liked her but did not appreciate or understand her deep interior life, which included visions and prophecies that she recorded in her diary. On February 22, 1931, she experienced a new and life changing vision of Christ in which he told her, “Paint an image according to the pattern you see with the prayer, “Jesus, I trust in you.” In due time with the help of her spiritual director, she found an artist to create the painting that was named The Divine Mercy and publicly shown for the first time on April 28, 1935. She devoted the rest of her life to spreading the message of divine mercy. Three years later, Sr. Faustina died of tuberculosis.
Devotion to the Divine Mercy was nothing new. Our Psalm today says, “His mercy endures forever.” St. Peter reminds us that we received a new birth because of God’s “great mercy.” And in today’s Gospel the Risen Jesus gives mercy as his first gift: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them…” Divine Mercy summarizes the message of the Bible and the gift of our Savior.
So, what is mercy? C.S. Lewis notes, “the essential act of mercy was to pardon; and pardon in its very essence involves the recognition of guilt in the recipient.” From God’s treasury of mercy, Jesus gave the apostles the gift of forgiving sins. God knows how often we can feel guilty and is generously offering us the opportunity to experience his divine mercy through the forgiveness of our sins.
Thirty years ago, Pope John Paul visited a young man in a prison cell who had attempted to assassinate him. They spoke quietly for 20 minutes. John Paul’s forgiveness was deeply Christian. He embraced his enemy and pardoned him. When he left the cell, the pope said, “What we talked about must remain a secret between us. I spoke to him as a brother whom I have pardoned and who has my complete trust.” This is an example of God’s divine mercy, the same divine mercy whose message St. Faustina witnessed.
Likewise in the sacrament of reconciliation, what is shared between the penitent and the confessor is kept a secret. Like Pope John Paul did, the confessor endeavors to speak as a brother to the penitent whom he can then pardon and the penitent in turn can trust that God indeed loves him.
In a homily given soon after he was elected, Pope Francissaid, “God’s patience has to call forth in us the courage to return to him, however many mistakes and sins there may be in our life. Jesus tells Thomas to put his hands in the wounds of his hands and in his side. We too can enter the wounds of Jesus. We can actually touch him. This happens every time we receive the sacraments with faith. It is there in the wounds of Jesus, that we are truly secure; there we encounter the boundless love of his heart… Maybe someone is thinking…my unbelief is like that of Thomas. I don’t have the courage to go back, to believe that God can welcome me and that He is wanting for me, of all people. But God is indeed wanting for you; he asks only of you, courage to go to him… Even if we are sinners, we are what is closest to his heart.”
Letting himself be enveloped by God’s divine mercy, Thomas was no longer an unbeliever. Like him, let us cast aside our doubts and trust that God’s mercy endures forever.
The message of mercy is that God loves us — all of us — no matter how great our sins. He wants us to recognize that His mercy is greater than our sins, so that we will call upon Him with trust, receive His mercy, and let it flow through us to others. Thus, all will come to share His joy. It is a message we can call to mind simply by remembering ABC.
A — Ask for His Mercy. God wants us to approach Him in prayer constantly, repenting of our sins and asking Him to pour His mercy out upon us and upon the whole world.
B — Be merciful. God wants us to receive His mercy and let it flow through us to others. He wants us to extend love and forgiveness to others just as He does to us.
C — Completely trust in Jesus. God wants us to know that the graces of His mercy are dependent upon our trust. The more we trust in Jesus, the more we will receive.