Homily (3) 2nd Sunday of
Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday) ABC: Fr. Michael U. Udoekpo
Readings: Acts 2:42-47; Ps 118:2-4,13-15,22-24; 1 Pet 1:3-9 (A);
Acts 4:32-35; 1 John 5:1-6 (B); Acts 5:12-16; Rev 1:9-11a, 12-13,17-19 (C) and
John 20:19-31(ABC)
Christ: Conduit of Divine Mercy!
Today the Church celebrates “Divine Mercy Sunday” commemorating
Jesus’ revelations to Saint Faustina on the Divine Mercy. Pope John Paul II
granted this Feast to the Universal Church on the occasion of his raising Sr.
Faustina, a young Polish woman to Sainthood on April 30, 2000 and was decreed
to be celebrated on the 2nd Sunday of Easter.
It is a teaching Sunday that invites us to
embrace Christ’s enthronement on the Cross, his Resurrection and his
multiple appearances to his seemingly disillusioned and doubting
disciples as nothing, but acts of love and divine mercy towards us.
Christ went to the cross freely to save us! (Song- "all the way
to Calvary... went for us..."). Peter in the Second reading,
particularly of Year A recognizes this when he says:
“Blessed
be the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, who in his great mercy gave us a new birth
to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead”
(1 Pet 1:3-9).
Christ’s disciples particularly those who lived through the
events of Palm Sunday to Easter needed the power of Christ’s Peace to calm
their fears and be strengthened in the supernatural gifts of faith and
fortitude through the Holy Spirit., wherever they were hiding for fear of the
"Jews."
I am sure we still recall the other day, in Luke Chapter 24:
13-35, at Emmaus, when Jesus walked besides Cleopas and his friend on their
return from Jerusalem, clouded in sad conversation they did not recognized
Jesus until the Risen Christ spent time breaking bread with them. Besides,
walking with his disciples, or breaking bread with them, he ate baked fish
with them (Lk 24:35-48) during other appearances. He also gave them encouraging
instruction by the beach at the Sea of Tiberias (John 21:1-14)
In today’s Gospel, John 20:19-31 read in years ABC, the Risen Lord appears to
the restless and frightened disciples with blessings of Peace (Shalom)! He
breathed on them and commissions them on a preaching mission with the power to
forgive sins, “whose sins you forgive are forgiven them and whose sins you
retain are retained” (Jon 20:23).
On a day like this, Divine Mercy Sunday, I would think that Our
Lord encourages us to be merciful to one another, in our homes, families and
communities. The Lord expects us to continue to appreciate the gift of the
sacrament of reconciliation in the Church. [ And when this celebration in done
in a Seminary, a house of formation of future priest for our parishes and
dioceses we cannot but continue to pray for our priests and would be priests to
see themselves as ministers of Divine Mercy and agents of shalom. And
this is confirm in last year’s ( 2011) documents from the Congregation for the
Clergy, The Priest, Minister of Divine Mercy….p. 3 which says, ‘ the
priest is a minister, that is to say that he is at the same time both a servant
and a prudent dispenser of Divine Mercy…”
The Holy Father, Pope Benedict the XVI in his 2010 Pastoral Letter to the Catholics
of Ireland, which is also applicable to every priests (and all of us)
urges priests themselves (and us) who have wrong others, “not to be “despair of
God’s Mercy,” that “Christ’s redeeming sacrifice has the power to forgive even
the gravest of sins, and to bring forth good from even the most terrible evil”]. Divine Mercy is sufficient unto each of us, all the Disciples of
Christ: mom, dad, children, clergy, priests, Seminarians, as it was for all
men, and women we hear in Scriptures.
Besides encouraging us to be "masters of
divine mercy", Christ invites us like Thomas to stop doubting; to be
believers. Christ invites us today to touch his wounds (John 20:19-31); wounds
that would heal Thomas’ wounds of disbelief and faithlessness; wounds
that replaces lack of peace with Peace of Christ; wounds that replaces the
spirit of darkness with God’s Spirit of Light. Christ’s wounds, a catalyst for
testimony of the healing truth, courage, unlimited mercy and inexhaustible love
of Christ. Christ’s wounds expels the power of injustice and heals the
wounds of indiscriminate shootings in our communities. It is this wounds that Thomas
touches in today’s Gospel. The wounds of love, unity; wounds that would empower
communion, the sharing (konoinia) and the preaching of the early
Christian Community.
This we are told in Acts of the Apostle (Year A): “All
who believed were together… (as we are today in this church) they devoted
themselves to the teaching of the apostles and to the communal life (Konoinia),
breaking of bread and praying together….” (Acts 2:42-47).
Moreover (Year B): “They were of one heart
and mind and no one claimed that any of his possessions was his own, but they
had everything in common…they bore witness to the Resurrection of Christ…”
(Acts 4:32-35).
Like Thomas, Mary Magdalene, Peter, Cleopas, and the Eleven Disciples,
we all do have moments of doubt, uncertainties, confusions, disbelief,
hopelessness, selfishness and frustrations. Conscious also of those
moments we might have acted uncharitably or mercilessly towards our neighbors,
we are invited today to deep our hands into those wounds of Christ! And
be filled with faith, hope, love, and spirit of charity and sense of oneness by
Christ, our wounded healer!
The Eucharist we shall soon move up to celebrates provides us a
fitting opportunity to deep our fingers into these wounds of Christ. It reminds
us of the goodness, the mercy of the Lord which demands our gratitude and
reciprocity of obedience to him, and in how we treat one another. For whatever
we do to the least of our brothers and sisters, so we do it unto the Lord.
As we worship and receive Christ today, May we be strengthen with mercy, love
(1 John 5:1-6), hope (1 Pet 1:3-9), faith and unity to always be able to say
with Thomas “My Lord and My God.”
And may our families, streets, neighborhood, churches and
workplaces continue to be true channels and conduits for the transmission of
Divine Mercy, and propagation of faith in the Risen Christ!
From Easter Sunday to Pentecost the Church celebrates those
fifty days that the Risen Jesus goes around by his appearances
strengthening the faith of his “seemingly” disillusioned disciples over the
events of the victory of the Cross; that supernatural event beyond the powers
of Anna, Caiaphas, the Sanhedrin and Pilate other opponents of Jesus. Even it
took a while, for friends of Christ, his mother, Mary Magdalene, his disciples,
the apostles, especially Thomas, being human like any of us to come to
terms with the mystery of the Resurrection (John 20:24-29). He needed to deep
his hands into the wounds of our Savior wounds; the wounds of peace and
assurances!
They needed the power of Christ’s Peace (love, reassurance,
well-being, okeyness) to calm their fears and be strengthened in the
supernatural gifts of faith and fortitude by the Holy Spirit, wherever they
were hiding for fear of persecution. You would recall that in Luke’s Gospel 24:
13-35, at Emmaus, when Jesus walked besides Cleopas and his friend on their
return from Jerusalem, clouded in sad conversation they did not recognized
Jesus until the Risen Christ spent time breaking bread with them. Besides,
walking with his disciples, or breaking bread with them in other appearances,
he ate baked fish with them (in Lk 24:35-48). He also gave them
encouraging instruction by the beach at the Sea of Tiberias (in John 21:1-14).
In today’s Gospel, John 20:19-31, the Risen Lord invites the
Doubting Thomas to touch his wounds. These wounds would heal Thomas’
wounds of doubts, disbelief and faithlessness; wounds that replaces lack of
peace with Peace of Christ; wounds that replaces the spirit of darkness with
God’s Spirit of Light. Thomas touches wounds of testimony to the healing truth,
courage, unlimited mercy and inexhaustible love of Christ. He touches
wounds of love, unity; wounds that would empower communion and the sharing and
the preaching of the early Christian Community.
We are told in Acts of the Apostle (Year A): “All
who believed were together… (as we are today in this church) they devoted
themselves to teaching of the apostles and to the communal life (Konoinia),
breaking of bread and praying together….” (Acts 2:42-47).
Moreover (Year B): “They
were of one heart and mind and no one claimed that any of his possessions was
his own, but they had everything in common. With great power the Apostles bore
witness to the Resurrection of Christ…” (Acts 4:32-35).
Our world and society today is broken or wounded with war and
threats of war. We are wounded by nuclear threats, and religious extremism (ISIS/Bokoharam,
etc). We are also wounded daily by all forms violence and abuse guns and
shootings, in our schools, homes, streets and public places! We are wounded
with rifts in our families, poverty and lack of consideration for the lowly, especially
by the upper class of political elites.
Like Thomas, Mary
Magdalene, Peter, Cleopas, and the Eleven Disciples we all do have moments of
doubt, uncertainties, confusions, disbelief, hopelessness and frustrations.
All these wounds can only be healed and soothed by our embrace of the
meaning of the wounds of Christ!
The Eucharist we celebrate today provides us a fitting
opportunity to dip our fingers into the wounds of Christ and be grateful for
what he has done for us, during the Holy Week and throughout this Easter! And may
we continue to be a merciful and loving (1 John 5:1-6). And with hope (1 Pet
1:3-9), faith and spirit of unity be able to always say with doubting Thomas,
“My Lord and My God”!
