Today we
celebrate not just the Second Sunday of Easter or the end of the Octave of
Easter. Today we celebrate a special
feast day called Divine Mercy Sunday.
This day was officially put on the Church Calendar by St. Pope John Paul
II, who was just canonized today in Rome
So what do we
mean when we talk about Divine Mercy? It means that this is a mercy that comes
from God and it is unlike any mercy that we may experience for humans. Mercy is about forgiveness. It's about being forgiven of whatever sins or
wrongdoing we may have done and any and all punishments for those sins have
been removed. When it comes to Divine
Mercy, then, all our sins are forgiven and the punishment that is being
pardoned is eternal death.
Our human
experience of mercy is nothing compared to Divine Mercy. It isn't like the game that boys might play
in which they inflict pain on each other until someone calls “mercy” or
“uncle”. It isn't like when we humans
try to forgive each other. As
Christians, we try our best to forgive those who have trespassed against
us. We know from experience, however,
that this is not always that easy.
Sometimes we have been hurt so badly, we find it difficult to reach
forgiveness. We keep working at it
because it is the right thing to do, but it's still hard. We may experience this in another way as well
in which we have sinned against another and then we seek forgiveness from them,
but they find it hard to forgive us. In
addition to all this, even if we are forgiven by another or we learn to forgive
someone else, the trust that was once there may be gone. Forgiveness is one thing; learning to trust
again is something completely different.
Fortunately
for us, Divine Mercy is nothing like our limited human ability to have
Mercy. As I already said, Divine Mercy
is the whole package. Forgiven of all
sin; acquitted of any punishment. God is
even able to continue to trust us after forgiving us; not like a naïve child
who keeps falling for the same practical joke several times is a row. He knows what He's doing. He even knows what we are going to do,
including all the sins that we will commit in the future, and He still trusts
us. By trusting us, He allows us to make
our own decisions. By trusting us, He
leaves Himself open to be saddened by our sins again and again. But He also allows us to freely choose to
love Him and serve Him. So, He trusts us
because He loves us and wants us close to Him.
He forgives us and has mercy on us because of that love.
Today's Gospel
is a great example of Divine Mercy in action.
We are all familiar with the sins of two of the Apostles during Holy
Week: Judas' betrayal and Peter's three denials of knowing Jesus. Today, however, we hear about another of the
Apostles: St. Thomas
I have to
admit, I always feel kind of sorry for Thomas whenever this reading comes
up. He reminds me of that poor guy who
misses that one meeting where all the decisions are made and then ends up with
all the jobs that no one else wants.
“Hey Tom! Sorry you couldn't make
that last meeting. By the way, we
elected you as chair person, hope you don't mind. And we're putting you in charge of planning
the company picnic next month. Have
fun!” So he misses out of being able to
see for himself that Christ is risen, which is unfortunate for him. All joking aside though, he had at least ten
of his closest friends (maybe a few others as well) telling him that they saw
Jesus alive again. Even with something
as extraordinary as hearing that someone has risen from the dead, I would think
that ten or more witnesses telling you that this has happened would be quite
convincing. We can debate all we want
about why he refused to believe. The point
is that he doubted.
Our focus for
this Sunday should not be simply on the doubting of Thomas. Our focus should rightly be on Jesus'
response. His response is not in anger
or frustration over Thomas' lack of faith.
He doesn't berate him for what he did or didn't do. I think we sometimes paint this picture of
God in our minds of someone who is in Heaven with a lighting-bolt in hand,
poised to smite us for the slightest infraction. God loves us to much for that, as I have been
saying. So His response to Thomas'
unbelief is not of wrath, but of mercy.
He simply tells him, “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.” We don't know exactly what
tone of voice Jesus used when He said that, but however He said it He didn't
dwell on it. He simply said, “Here is
your proof, now start believing”. In His
never ending love and mercy, He is saying “Your sins are forgiven, now go in
peace.”
We may or may
not have had to struggle in our faith life with whether or not Jesus truly rose
from the dead, but like St. Thomas
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