Readings:
Acts 2:42-47; 1Peter 1:3-9; Jn. 20:19-31
Touch
Christ’s Wounds and Receive His Mercy
Easter is a
celebration of the sacred and the secular, the celestial and the mundane, faith
and doubt, the absence and the presence. It is a celebration of hate and love,
the merciless and the merciful. It is a celebration of God’s mercy to mankind.
Today, the 2nd Sunday of Easter, is the Divine Mercy Sunday. This
devotion was promoted by St. John Paul ll. On April 30, 2000, during the
Canonization of Faustina Kowalska, which took place on the second Sunday of
Easter, the Pope officially designated this day as the Divine Mercy Sunday.
This devotion is based on Sr. Faustina’s encounter with Jesus. According to the
dairy of Faustina, she received from Jesus the biggest promises of grace
related to the Devotion of Divine Mercy, in particular that a person who goes
to sacramental confession and receives Holy Communion on that day, shall obtain
the total forgiveness of all sins and punishment. In his message on April 22,
2001, a year after establishing the Divine Mercy Sunday, Pope John Paul ll
emphasized during his Easter message: “Jesus said to St. Faustyna one
day: “Humanity will never find peace until it turns with trust to Divine
Mercy.” Divine Mercy! This is the Easter gift that the Church receives from the
risen Christ and offers to humanity.”
The readings at
this Mass reflect the mercy of God. In the first reading we see the community
of God’s people bound together in mercy and love. Broken, yes, but full of
hope. They enjoyed communal life, sharing, selling of property and goods,
caring for each one’s needs, and sharing meals together. In this community
there was someone who denied Christ, those who ran away from Him, the one who
was absent from community gathering and prayer, and of course, those who wanted
a share in the restored kingdom of Israel. Yet in the Gospel, Christ met them
all together and wished them peace. There was no condemnation, no
judgement, no malice, no anger; only love, forgiveness and mercy. Come,
touch my wounds and be healed. Doubt no longer, it is I, do not be afraid.
Yes, there was
healing, there was forgiveness; faith was restored, and a profession of faith
was made: My Lord and my God! This is what mercy means: to have a
heart for those who suffer or to have a heart willing to suffer for others. “Christ
suffered for you, leaving you an example that you should follow in his
footsteps.” (1Peter 2:21). But that is not all. Christ gave the Spirit
to His Apostles and entrusted to them the power to forgive sins. We
experience the mercy of God more when we humble ourselves and go to Him in the
sacrament of reconciliation and penance. There we meet, face to face
with the God of mercy and love, a God of forgiveness, who said through Ezekiel
the prophet: “As I live, says the Lord God, I swear I take no pleasure in
the death of the wicked man, but rather in the wicked man’s conversion, that he
may live.” (33:11).
With the mercy of
God, we know and are convinced that good will always triumph over evil, that
life is stronger than death and that God’s love is more powerful than our sins.
In the Paschal mystery we just celebrated, God our Father appeared to us as He is,
a tender-hearted Father, who does not give up in the face of his children’s
ingratitude and is always ready to forgive. As Paul reminds us, “Where
sin increased, grace overflow all the more, so that as sin reigned in death,
grace also might reign through justification for eternal life through Jesus
Christ our Lord.” (Rom. 5:21-22).
Our opening prayer
address the Father as “God of everlasting mercy.” And the psalm
repeated several times, “His steadfast love endures forever.” All
these readings illustrate God’s mercy in action. We are invited to share what
we have with others, to feed the hungry, to fight injustice, to stand up for
the truth and for what is right, and to know that God’s mercy is everlasting. If
we see ourselves as undeserved recipients of God’s mercy and love, we will come
to understand that ultimately, mercy results, not so much from human effort, as
from God’s free gift to humanity.
And so today we
are invited to experience God’s mercy if, in turn we want to be able to forgive
others. For that is what we pray for in the Lord’s prayer: “And forgive
us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” The
spiral hatred and violence which stains with blood the path of so many
individuals and nations, the world over, can only be broken and healed by the
miracle of forgiveness and mercy. For God’s mercy is His way of dealing
with the broken world and humanity that is so consumed with insatiable hunger
for power. Let us commit our lives to the mercy of God. Let us resolve
today to show mercy instead of judging others harshly and irrationally. May
we not be so concerned with the wrong-doings of others for, “If you, Lord, mark
our sins, Lord, who can stand? But with you is forgiveness and so
you are revered.” (Ps. 130:3). May we always treat others as we want to
be treated ourselves. Amen.
Rev.
Augustine Etemma Inwang, MSP
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