April 27, 2025 At Saint Peter and Saint William Churches in Naples, FL
Acts 5:12-16 + Psalm 118 + Revelation 1:9-11, 12-13, 17-19 + John 20:19-31
“I have seen the Lord” says Mary Magdalene. “We have seen the Lord” the disciples tell Thomas. These declarations bring to a climax a theme of sight and blindness that runs through John’s Gospel as a whole. At an earlier time, some Greeks come to the disciples saying, “We wish to see Jesus,” but he hides from view and reveals himself only to the disciples. It’s as though he does not really want to be seen except after he has risen. After the resurrection there are always the wounds suggesting that if we do not see Jesus on the cross as well as in resurrected glory, we will not see him at all.
Perhaps then, wounds are important for recognizing Jesus, and there are plenty of wounds around these days. Wounded people are everywhere except where politicians want to hide them. As a Church, we feed them, we comfort them, and we do so because we can see not with the eye, but with the soul. We believe. Notice in this Gospel that Thomas does not want to see Jesus. He wants to see the wounds. This is not about whether the resurrection is real or not. It is about whether it matters or not. It is one thing to believe that Jesus was raised from the dead. It is quite another to believe that it can mean anything for our lives.
The marks and wounds still matter today, but they are not the ones in the side and hands of Jesus. They are our wounds, the ones in this city and everywhere people suffer.
We hear so many stories from people without faith that include their disillusionment with the church, and our failure to make real what we profess. What this world is looking for, at heart, is some legitimate and trustworthy connection with the Divine. That can happen when we are present revealing the love, the patience, the forgiveness and mercy of God.
Faith in the Resurrection of Christ is not a dogma we have to believe. It is a new way of life that comes from the conviction that Christ’s new life is ours as well. The Resurrection is not a mystery to be clung to either. It is a practice that develops in new and deeper ways as we live into it. With practice, our lives will proclaim the presence of Christ in every wounded, living human being. As we perfect a new way of life that recognizes the living Christ in every single one of God’s children, wars will cease, hunger will vanish, and those most abandoned, avoided, and feared will be embraced, while those who do not believe come from darkness into the light.