Jesus, I trust in you – those are the words associated with Divine Mercy Sunday. We put our trust in the Jesus – and we receive the graces of the new creation, the graces of Christ which are as merciful as they are transformative. As Divine Mercy Sunday happens on the eighth day of the Paschal celebration, it echoes the fact that the joy of the resurrection is the joy of the new, everlasting week. We have gone beyond the first week of Genesis and entered the second, eternal week. Jesus is the New Adam. After we join ourselves to him, after being “born from above”(John 3:3), and putting on the new, restored humanity, he leads us into the glorious, merciful, loving heart of the Trinity to experience the divine life.
Yet, Divine Mercy Sunday is also Thomas Sunday. It is the day we remember the Apostle Thomas, and his first encounter with the risen Christ. “With his inquisitive right hand, Thomas probed Thy life-giving side, O Christ our God. For when Thou didst enter, the doors being shut, with the rest of the Apostles he cried to Thee: Thou art my Lord and my God.” (Kontakion of Thomas Sunday)
Thomas had heard from the other Apostles that Christ had risen from the dead, but he didn’t believe. His faith had been shattered. He needed evidence. He needed to see it for himself. “Eight days later, his disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was with them. The doors were shut, but Jesus came and stood among them, and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ Then he said to Thomas, ‘Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side; do not be faithless, but believing.’ Thomas answered him, ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus said to him, Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe‘” (John 20:26 – 28).
There is something of Thomas in many, if not all, of us. We experience doubts. We need reassurance. Of course, most of us do not have the resurrected Christ coming to us in the way he came to Thomas, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have Christ coming to us, and helping us to have that faith. Christ didn’t leave us as orphans; we have the Spirit of Christ, the Holy Spirit, guiding us; we have Christ in communion, transforming us, making us “partakers of the divine nature” (2Pet 1:4).
But faith and trust can be difficult. Our spiritual life has its ups and downs, and our sin can cloud our proper reception and appreciation of the divine gifts bestowed upon us by our baptism, chrismation, and communion. We must struggle to have faith. We must struggle to trust. Yet, that is what Thomas Sunday, what Divine Mercy Sunday is about. It is an affirmation of that struggle and our willingness to trust, to believe, despite all our weaknesses, despite all our human frailty. “I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24). Christ affirms the struggle for faith, and shares with us his great loving mercy, especially because we have put our trust in him in the midst of our doubts. Our attraction to Christ, our love for the truth, is so great – that our doubts, while they might still exist and require attention – are overcome. True faith is not one without question, it is one which lets love lead the way. And with all love, it means we must give ourselves completely over to God. “Jesus, I trust in you.”
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