Seeing is Not Believing - Sunday After Easter Year C

I've often imagined myself, a native of Buffalo, NY, being away from America for many years and apart from any news whatever. Someone then comes to me and says the Buffalo Bills won the Super Bowl. Needless to say, I'm a bit skeptical, but I want to believe it with all my heart. Still, I would want some proof for this miraculous news. In some way, I could identify with Thomas in today's Gospel text. However, the comparison would not do justice to the full import of today's readings, for in reality this week's liturgical theme has to do with the response of faith to the risen Jesus.

Rather than seeing the Gospel reading as being about Thomas, another reading of the text would have us focus our attention on the eleven who saw the Risen Jesus first. While still afraid afterward (they were still in the locked upper room eight days later), they nonetheless felt compelled to tell Thomas about their experience with Jesus and encouraged him to believe. Through their efforts Thomas was present the next time in order to experience Jesus' second appearance. On Easter we have renewed our baptismal vows and new members of the Church have been baptized and confirmed. We have encountered the risen Christ, and so we must encourage others to meet Jesus alive and present to them as well.

St. Augustine made a similar point to his flock centuries ago: "So, then, on Saturday next, on which we shall celebrate the Vigil, God willing, you will have to render not the Prayer (the Our Father), but the 'Symbolum' (the Creed); because if you do not learn it now, afterwards you will not be hearing it every day in the Church from the people. And, in learning it well, say it every day so as to not forget it: when getting up from bed, when you are going to sleep, pronounce your 'Symbolum'; pronounce it to God, striving to learn it by heart, and don't be lazy about repeating it. It is a good thing to repeat so as not to forget. Don't say: 'I have already said it yesterday, I am saying it today and I say it everyday: I have it well engraved in my memory.' Let it be for you a reminder of your faith and a mirror in which you see yourself reflected. Look at it yourself, then, in it; check to see if you continue believing all the truths that you say in words that you believe, and rejoice daily in your faith. Let them be your riches; let them be as an apparel for the adornment of your soul" (St. Augustine, Sermon 58, 15).

John, the author of the book of Revelation, took the creed seriously and passed the faith on to others. For this apostolic endeavor, he found himself exiled to the island of Patmos by the Roman Empire. Unable to be in contact with others, John becomes discouraged until he sees this vision of the risen Jesus in the heavenly Jerusalem, a sight that frightened him just as the sight of Jesus on that first Easter morning. Nevertheless, John is encouraged to write down what he has experienced. Through his writing John will be able to pass along the faith to others.

Finally, the first reading recounts the response of the entire Christian community to the risen Jesus and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit they have experienced at Pentecost. As a result of their witness for the faith, more and more people came to believe in the Lord and the young church grew in numbers. What is more, their ministry was focused on care for the sick and the poor, an essential element of Christian living in every age. Thus, by gathering together in community for prayer we come to know our ultimate destiny and vocation in life. As the Second Vatican Council taught: "Only by the light of faith and by meditation on the word of God can one always and everywhere know God in whom 'we live and move and have our being', seek His will in every agent, see Christ in everyone whether he be a relative or stranger, and take correct judgments about the true meaning and value of temporal things both in themselves and in their relation to man's final goal" (Vatican II, Apostolican actuositatem, 4).

If we live by this faith and genuinely put it into practice in our lives, then we too will lead others to Christ and to his Church. We will open schools instead of close them, grow deeper in Christian unity around the bishops as the authentic teachers of Christian faith, and provide a ministry of healing to the sick that protects all human life from conception to natural death and leaves no one uncovered. We pray, "God of mercy, you wash away our sins in water, you give us new birth in the Spirit, and redeem us in the blood of Christ. As we celebrate Christ's resurrection increase our awareness of these blessings, and renew your gift of life within us" (Opening Prayer).