By Fr. Edmund Power, OSB

Today’s gospel from John 20 describes events that take place on two successive Sunday evenings: the first is the day of the Resurrection and the second is the following Sunday, that is today.

As always with the fourth Evangelist, we must read with a particular sensitivity to deeper meanings.

On each occasion the disciples are in a room; there is a claustrophobic feeling of closure within a limited space, a kind of prison constructed of fear and self-protection.

Or shifting the image, a space like a tomb in the rock, sealed by a great stone. Jesus has risen, but now he enters into the tomb of the disciples’ deadening fear.

On each of the Sundays, with the repeated insistence, the doors being shut and the doors were shut, the text hints at something not entirely literal. Jesus has entered to lead them out of fear into a new life.

His opening greeting on each occasion is quasi-liturgical in form: Peace be with you. This is immediately followed by the manifestation of His wounds.

There is no pretence that the Passion did not really occur, or that the Passion is not central to what is happening now. They too, like us, will have to experience suffering.

Jesus already told Peter at the Supper, where I am going you cannot follow me now; but you shall follow afterward (Jn 13:36). The disciples’ reaction to His appearance is joy (the disciples were glad when they saw the Lord) and then, repeating the peace, He breathes on them the gift of the Holy Spirit: this is a Pentecost moment in the fourth Gospel.

Paul tells us that the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace (Gal 5:22). In the paschal context of today’s gospel, the very first fruits of the Spirit are given and received.

Love is not mentioned explicitly, but can we doubt its presence, when Jesus has already told His disciples, greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends (Jn 15:13).

With the arrival of Thomas on the second Sunday, we too enter into the drama. Perhaps we share his scepticism: can we really believe what we have never seen? Can we take another’s word for it? Can there be peace and joy within the confines of our fears and of the difficulties we face in the world of today?

Thomas sees and believes, but the faith he expresses in the words of the culminating declaration of the gospel – My Lord and my God! – is not in fact the real summit. There is an even higher faith: blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.

Among this multitude all of us stand; our faith in the Lord is driven by hope and love: His love for us and our trusting response to it.