Divine Mercy and the Christian Vocation Today
St. Thomas was once on fire and full of zeal in following Jesus. When Jesus spoke of going back to the hostile Judean territory to raise Lazarus from the dead, all the other disciples tried to dissuade Him, “Rabbi, the Jews were just trying to stone you, and you want to go back there?” But Thomas led the charge with courageous words, “Let also go and die with Him” (Jn 11:1-16).
We see a different Thomas a few days later after the resurrection. All the other disciples were giving witness to him about the risen Christ whom they had seen earlier. Now, Thomas was shaking in his faith and the best that he could muster was a conditional act of faith, “Unless I see…. Unless I put my finger…, I will not believe.”
This is a lesson for each and every one of us. Because of our fallen nature, no matter how firm our good resolutions are or our fidelities in the past, nothing human guarantees our fidelity to Jesus always. We are easily overcome by our emotions, fears, self-preservation, laziness, pride, public opinion, etc. Thus, we constantly need to be raised up over and over again after we have fallen.
This is what divine mercy is all about. In Jesus Christ, God is always stooping down to us to raise us to deeper communion with Him and greater participation in the fidelity of Jesus Christ. The risen Christ would not leave a single disciple of His in doubt but would return to the disciples a second time just to raise Thomas from His doubts and to elicit from him a firm faith in the divinity of Christ, “My Lord, and my God” (Jn 20). For Thomas, there is no longer anything conditional about his faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
“As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Jesus thus teaches that we are called to share in the very intimate life of the Triune God and be faithful to the Father just as He was faithful. What a high calling we have as Christians! This lofty calling is possible for us only if we experience and respond appropriately to the mercy of God through the power of the Holy Spirit, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.”
Let us briefly reflect on how divine mercy touches all aspects of our lives and how we are to respond to it so that we can be faithful in our communion with God.
