12 April, 2026:–Second Sunday of Easter, Year A: Acts 2:42-47; 1Peter 1:3-9; John 20:19-31
Thomas was willing to follow Jesus to Jerusalem to die with him (Jn 11:16). But at his arrest, Jesus said, “…let these men go.” Did Thomas realize then that Jesus was called to something unique, if unknown to Thomas; that it wasn’t his time to die?
After the crucifixion, the other apostles had locked themselves in the upper room out of fear, but Thomas wasn’t with them. Perhaps he was not afraid of arrest and martyrdom. When he does join them, he knows about the wounds in Jesus’ hands and his pierced side: evidently, he was well-informed and these facts are important to him.
All four gospels attest that Jesus refers to his death as an important event of his mission. I can’t claim that I understand death, but death is a familiar human experience. You and I have witnessed death, have lost loved ones to death, been edified by the self-surrender and trust of the dying, or relieved in the passing of a troubled life.
What Jesus also said about his rising from the dead can be trickier to register: I have no experience of that.
Could it be any different for Thomas? Perhaps, he was stuck in the ideal of death as a powerful testimony to Jesus’ mission.
But something told Thomas to rejoin his comrades—and there he discovers not death, but life more powerful than death. There he encounters God fully present in the risen Jesus: My Lord and my God!
What courage it must take to face resurrection, a fullness of life about which I have experienced nothing!
Isn’t it easier to just resign myself to death than to face new life?