April 15, 2012
2nd Sunday of Easter - Divine Mercy Sunday
Impossible to sink -- even for God but an iceberg! 100 years ago (April 14, 1913) the Titanic sank to the depth of the North Atlantic. 1500 died. 6 were saved from the frigid water.700 persons waited in life boats with nothing to do but wait -- wait to die; wait to live; wait for absolution which would never come. Survivors guilt. A "boat" is a metaphor in the New Testament for disciples clinging to life. Jesus comes across the waters to calm the wind and waves, to calm their fears and to be with them. In our Gospel today (according to John) the disciples are wayfarers not in a boat but in a room with locked doors. The Risen One enters and bids them peace. Breathing -- Jesus imparts the Holy Spirit and commissions them to forgive. Thomas is not with them. He refuses to believe unless he can see and probe the wounds. A week later Jesus appears again and asks Thomas to put his finger into Jesus' side. Thomas makes a profound witness of faith: "My Lord and my God." "Doubting Thomas occasions the last beatitude of Jesus: "Blessed are those have not see and have believed." Jesus gives his disciples "absolution" -- divine mercy -- as a bequest to receive and to share. In God's mercy, we wait with hope.
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