Feast of St. Thomas the Apostle

July 03, Saturday

Readings for the Feast

Ephesians 2:19-22

Responsorial Psalm: Ps 117:1bc, 2 

John 20:24-29

Word count: 661

Reading speed

Slow (100 wpm): 6.6 minutes

Average (130 wpm): 5.1 minutes

Fast (160 wpm): 4.1 minutes

Common people say that believing in God is hard. For them they do not see that he is answering their prayers. There are no signs, no proof that he is working in their lives. And they began to wonder: Why should they continue to have faith? They don’t “feel”  anything. Personally for some reasons for I too have experience the same sentiments. Sometimes the spiritual dryness that can come upon us is itself a cross. This is when our faith and our love of God are more important than ever. In difficult times we must take up our cross and persevere in prayer.

 

The apostle Thomas was surely in a crisis of faith after Jesus died. Hearing from his brothers that they have seen the Lord alive did not help a bit. He felt even more abandoned and alone. He determined that he would not believe that Jesus really rose from the dead until he could actually touch his wounds. Jesus came back to give Thomas exactly what he asked for: not only proof that he was alive, but also proof that he loves him. Jesus revealed his heart to his troubled disciple; he invited him into his heart. Divine love- divine mercy- was the power behind Jesus’ urgent invitation: “Do not persist in your unbelief, but believe! When Thomas saw that the Lord had not abandoned him, that he had not rejected him for his doubts, his stubbornness and his arrogance, he was humbled and filled with light. He was able to make the leap of faith and to utter the glorious acclamation: “My Lord and my God!” Jesus often challenged the apostles to believe in him and to love him.

He does the same with us. He knows that the way of faith is sometimes hard for us, yet at times he seems to make it even harder, telling us about the cross or about persecution. When life is going along just fine, we find easy to believe in Jesus. In those times, we may even become complacent in our prayer life. We tend to drift, skip or forget to pray, or not think it is very important- until something goes wrong! Then we suddenly remember how much we need God’s help. We remember to pray.  

God in his mercy will always accept us back if we stray. “For steadfast is his kindness toward us, and the fidelity of the Lord endures forever.” He is never the one who leave us; we are the ones who forget him or ignore him. Our failure to “see” and “hear” him has more to do with the weakness of our faith than with his absence. We cannot see him with our eye, it is true, as Thomas did, but we can believe what Thomas believed – that Jesus is our Lord and our God. Then we receive the blessing that Jesus announced to Thomas: “Blest are they who have not seen and have believed.” When Thomas came to faith, he suddenly discovered that he was part of the community of faith, the Church. Not only had the Lord not abandoned him, his brother apostles had not abandoned him either. 

We too are not alone in our faith. We are “fellow citizens of the saints and members of the household of God.” This is the encouraging message of today’s first reading, an especially important message in the age of ever increasing social fragmentation and isolation. By our faith in Jesus Christ and our being incorporated into his Body the Church, we are “strangers and aliens no longer.” Each of us is a real part, a small but significant part, of the holy temple that God has built as a dwelling place for himself. When we stand firm on the foundation of faith of the apostles, including Thomas, we can be sure that God is always with us, for he dwell within us. 

Amen. . .

St. Thomas the Apostle, pray for us.

Rev. Joseph Casiao, SSS

Image credit: flickr.com (creative commons)