Rev. Fr. (Dr.) Osmond Anike

Readings:

First Reading: Acts 2:42-47 – The faithful all lived together and owned everything in common.

Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 117(118): 2-4, 13-15, 22-24 – Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, for his love has no end.

Second Reading: 1 Peter 1:3-9 – You did not see Christ, yet you love him.

Gospel: John 20:19-31 – Eight days later, Jesus came again and stood among them.

Since the year 2000, St. Pope John Paul II established the second Sunday of Easter as the feast of Divine Mercy. However, the devotion to Divine Mercy dates back earlier, and originated as a result of private revelations that Sr. Faustina Kowalska was said to have had between 1931 and 1938. Faustina was a member of the Sisters of Divine Mercy. And in one of the revelations, she had a vision of Jesus Christ urging her to have trust in His mercy and to share that mercy with others in prayers, words and actions. Sr. Faustina described the posture of Jesus Christ in that appearance and how Jesus wanted that posture to be painted. According to her description, Jesus appeared with one hand raised in blessing, and the other touching his heart from which streamed red and white rays of light. The white rays were interpreted to represent the waters of baptism – the forgiveness of sins. The red rays were interpreted to represent our savior’s blood shed for us on the cross, and which becomes for us the source of life. Therefore, when blood and water flowed from the Lord’s side after he was pierced on the cross, it is understood that in him is found both forgiveness of our sins as well as our source of life

In other revelations that Sr. Faustina had, the Lord commanded that the chaplet of the Divine Mercy be said; and that the feast of the Divine Mercy be held on the second Sunday of Easter. This Sunday marks the Octave of Easter (the 8^th day of Easter); and it is the Sunday next to the day we celebrated the practical demonstration of God’s mercy to humankind through his suffering, death and resurrection. In fact, this resurrection “day” is celebrated on each of the eight days within the Octave, beginning with Easter Sunday and ending today. Each of these days is celebrated as “Easter day” when Christ our Passover has been sacrificed. His resurrection is indeed a demonstration of his divine mercy to us because it opened the way for us to everlasting life.

In the first reading of today from the Acts of the Apostles, we recounted how the nascent Christian community was bonded together by four principal elements namely: faithfulness to the teaching of the apostles; brotherhood; breaking of bread; and, prayers. The reading analyzed the consequences of these four elements.

The first element is faithfulness to the teaching of the apostles which led to “many miracles and signs”. It was important for the community to be faithful to the teachings of the apostles because, they (the apostles) were themselves faithful to the teachings of the Lord. Because of this faithfulness, miracles occurred. From this we can only conclude that real miracles happen as a result of faithfulness to teachings that are directly linked to the apostles. Apostolicity is, after all, one of the four marks of the Church.

The second element is that of brotherhood. Consequent upon of their strong brotherhood, the reading tells us that they lived a life of communalism where, thanks to the redistribution of their common wealth, nobody was left behind in abject poverty. The Western world has tried extreme capitalism for centuries now. The question is: has it really worked? The irony of capitalism is that the poorest people in the world are found in countries with greatest wealth. And the reason is simple: those wealth are usually owned and controlled by about 1% of the population’s supper rich, leaving the remaining 99% of the population in abject poverty. The coronavirus quarantine, though, has now forced many of these countries to experiment on this early church’s principle of brotherhood by taking some steps to redistribute at least certain part of their common wealth so that the economically disadvantaged individuals can have some palliatives given to them directly by those in charge of the common wealth of these countries. However, although commendable, I must confess that it appears that in many of these cases, the goal is not so much to help the less privileged as to ensure their own political survival.

The third and fourth elements are the breaking of bread and, prayers. In this regard, we see the community going as a body to the Temple every day to pray in order to fulfil their Jewish religious obligation. But they had to meet again in their houses for the breaking of bread (apparently something that was not included in the daily Jewish Temple rituals). The breaking of bread became an important element in the early Christians’ ritual after the events of the Last Super in which Jesus directed the Apostles to “do this in memory of me”. The nascent community could not feel completely fulfilled after the daily Temple prayers until they had broken the bread. This breaking of bread metamorphosed into our present day Eucharist. In the same way, we cannot be totally fulfilled unless we have partaken of the breaking of bread (Eucharist). It is not for nothing that the Eucharist is described as the source and summit of our lives. It is understandable that the present corona world has made it impossible for people to have this fulfilment. But this current situation should be viewed as exceptions rather than as rules.

As we have seen, if there is one word that can describe these four elements found in the early Christian community, it is the word “togetherness”. Together, they were faithful to the teachings of the apostles; together they redistributed their common wealth; together they went to the Temple to pray; and together they returned to individual houses to break bread. They stayed together and bonded. And one of the benefits of staying together was demonstrated in the gospel of today with the appearance of the risen Jesus in their midst. They were all staying together as a group, with one notable absentee – Thomas. When Jesus appeared and made himself be seen, the one who was absent did not benefit from that miracle of seeing the risen Lord. Let’s be clear though; Thomas could have been absent for a variety of good reasons. The text did not tell us the reason why he was absent. Therefore, we are not in a position to objectively criticize him for being absent. What, if he was sent on an errand by the group? But one fact is clear: he was absent when the Lord appeared, and therefore, could not have the privilege, which others had, of “seeing” the risen Lord. And no matter the genuineness of, or the cogency of reasons for, his absence, the Lord did not privately appear to him. What we need to learn from this is that the collectivity of the church supersedes any individuality. Jesus makes his presence known more when the church gathers as a unit than when individuals do their own things their own way. And it is not just the risen Lord alone; as we shall see on the Pentecost day, the Holy Spirit descends on the community of the faithful when they are gathered together and united in prayers as one. Well, for Thomas, despite his initial doubt, he understood that in order to witness the appearance of Jesus, he needed to put aside whatever responsibility that had been taking him away from the community and stay with them. And sure enough, exactly eight days later, the risen Lord appeared again and this time, he not only witnessed him with the rest but gave a confession of faith that others didn’t namely, “My Lord and my God”.

Brethren, we have a thousand and one genuine reasons why we absent ourselves from the community of the faithful: Our works are such that they don’t permit us to fulfil our Sunday obligation; our family responsibilities are so important that we just can’t set them aside for a little while even on Sundays; our physiology is so constituted that having over stretched it from Monday to Saturday, it is only on Sundays that we get the chance to rest it by having good sleep; etc. These and similar reasons might be cogent enough. But remember, when the risen Lord appears in your absence, he is not going to wait for you because you are not there. He will manifest himself to those who are there. Could we be clear-sighted enough like Thomas to realize that when it comes to our lives of faith, waiting for the risen Lord supersedes every other personal engagement? We should not just seek to have enough reasons to be absent but not a single reason to be present. Our “genuine” reasons may not be reasonable enough to God. When he directed his disciples not to leave Jerusalem but to wait for the Holy Spirit, he knew that they had families to carter for; he knew that they had jobs to do; he knew that they had friends and families to visit. Yet, he told them to wait. And thanks to their waiting, their patience paid off when the Holy Spirit descended on them.

As we celebrate the feast of the Divine Mercy, let us revisit the four principles that guided the early church namely, faithfulness to the teachings of the apostles, brotherhood, prayer and breaking of bread. All these principles were realized in the atmosphere of togetherness. May this spirit of togetherness bind us as a community!