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<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\u201cThese signs have been written that you may believe.\u201d<\/p>\n
In today\u2019s gospel, Thomas needs help in order to believe.
\nHe needs a sign.<\/p>\n
Who can blame him?
\nHis friends were making a pretty far-fetched claim.
\nJesus is risen from the dead?
\nThomas had seen Jesus crucified.
\n\u201cProve it to me,\u201d he says. \u201cShow me the wounds.\u201d<\/p>\n
And Jesus does prove it to Thomas.
\nIn his mercy, Jesus appears a week later.
\nThomas sees the wounds.
\nHe also sees the living Christ.
\nAnd he responds,
\n\u201cMy Lord and my God.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thomas needed to see both the wounds and the living Christ.<\/p>\n
In our time, too, we look for signs.
\nWe want to know that after the crucifixion comes the resurrection.<\/p>\n
We\u2019re all wounded in one way or another,
\nand we want to know that there is a life beyond our wounds.<\/p>\n
All Thomas could think about were the wounds that Jesus had received.<\/p>\n
Sometimes that\u2019s all we can think about: our own wounds.
\nThey\u2019re so overwhelming
\nthat we can\u2019t see past them to new life.<\/p>\n
If we want examples of the overwhelming power of woundedness
\nwe only have to look at the lives of Angelo, Karl, and Amy.<\/p>\n
Angelo was the son of a sharecropper in a small country village.
\nHe lost his mother, a brother, and four sisters to cancer.
\nIn fact, when his mother was close to death
\nhis work duties prevented him from being there in her final hours.
\nCancer was also to claim Angelo\u2019s life–
\nstomach cancer.
\nIt came in midst of a an monumental project he had started,
\na project that he hoped would change the world.
\nHe did not live to see that project completed.<\/p>\n
Karl had his wounds to deal with too.
\nHe once said,
\n\u201cI was not at my mother\u2019s death, I was not at my brother\u2019s death,
\nI was not at my father\u2019s death.
\nAt twenty, I had already lost all the people I loved.\u201d
\nThings got worse for Karl before they got better.
\nHe had to hide from the Nazis,
\nHe survived bullet wounds that perforated his colon and small intestines,
\nand in his old age he ended up struggling with Parkinson\u2019s Disease.<\/p>\n
And then there\u2019s Amy.
\nAmy was only 19 years old when she was hospitalized with meningitis.
\nThe meningitis affected her circulatory system, and within 24 hours,
\nthe infection went into septic shock.
\nDoctors gave Amy less than a 2% chance of survival.
\nShe lost both of her kidneys, her spleen, the hearing in her left ear,
\nand both of her legs had to be amputated below the knees.<\/p>\n
Angelo, Karl, and Amy are signs of the woundedness of the world.<\/p>\n
But we all walk through this life wounded.
\nSome of us are physically wounded,
\nothers are emotionally or psychologically wounded,
\nand still others are spiritually wounded.<\/p>\n
But in our woundedness
\nJesus calls us to new life
\nso that we can be signs of faith to the world.<\/p>\n
To be a Christian is to let our woundedness transform us.
\nThat\u2019s what Jesus shows Thomas, and that\u2019s what he shows us.<\/p>\n
\u201cPut your finger here and see my hands,<\/em> The wounded Body of Christ is all around us, here in this church. Through his wounds, through our wounds, Easter is a call to be a sign of faith, This is what the disciples did. When they huddled together in their woundedness Out of the woundedness of Christ, How?<\/p>\n By devoting themselves to the teachings of the apostles, And that\u2019s how we find new life in the face of our wounds. If, in our woundedness, People see us devoted, first, to the teachings of the apostles We see this kind of devotion in Karl\u2019s life. The second way to move from woundedness to life Amy\u2019s life demonstrates how to live the communal life. And finally, we are devoted to the breaking of the bread We see devotion to the breaking of the bread in Angelo\u2019s life. The world knows Angelo Roncalli as Pope John XXIII, In spite of their wounds, This weekend the world celebrates Millions of people gather in Rome But what about Amy?<\/p>\n Well, sometimes the signs of faith come from within the Church, Amy\u2019s story doesn\u2019t end with the loss of her kidneys, spleen or amputated feet. Amy became a snowboarder, winning back to back world cup gold medals. I stumbled across the show \u201cDancing with the Stars,\u201d She and her dance partner were leaping and twirling around the stage It made me want to shout Now, I don\u2019t know Amy\u2019s religious background, Amy dances in her woundedness. When we see people who are wounded, What a great image for us on this Divine Mercy Sunday. \u201cThese signs have been written that you may believe.\u201d<\/p>\n May we, like Angelo, Karl, and Amy,
\n and bring your hand and put it into my side,<\/em>
\n and do not be unbelieving, but believe.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n
\nBut the resurrected Christ is here, too.<\/p>\n
\nwe come to belief.<\/p>\n
\nto show the world that our wounds do not get the final say.<\/p>\n
\nThey, too, were wounded.
\nThey were hurt by the loss of their Lord.
\nAs they gathered in the upper room
\nthey felt the humiliation of having seen their savior
\ncrucified by the Romans.
\nThey were paralyzed by fear for their own lives.<\/p>\n
\nJesus appeared in their midst
\nand showed them how to move from wounds to resurrection.<\/p>\n
\nand out of their own woundedness,
\nthe early Church came to new life.
\nAnd they drew people to Jesus.<\/p>\n
\nto the communal life,
\nand to the breaking of the bread.<\/p>\n
\nBecause we can arise out of our woundedness.
\nAs a matter of fact, it is only through our wounds
\nthat we can be resurrected.<\/p>\n
\nwe devote ourselves to the teachings of the apostles,
\nto the communal life,
\nand to the breaking of the bread,
\nthen we are born into new life,
\nand we become signs of faith for the community.<\/p>\n
\nwhen we acknowledge the truths of our faith,
\neven if they\u2019re contrary to what we see in today\u2019s culture.
\nWhen we hold fast to all that the apostles have handed on to us
\nin the midst of our pain and suffering
\nthen the community understands the life that Christ offers.<\/p>\n
\nKarl, in spite of an attempt on his life,
\nin spite of his struggles with Parkinson\u2019s,
\nspent the majority of his life making the teachings of the apostles
\nclear and accessible to the Church,
\nand encouraging people to live those teachings to the full.<\/p>\n
\nis to be devoted to the communal life.
\nWe are devoted to the communal life
\nwhen we help the poor,
\ntaking care of those who need help
\nin the midst of our own woundedness.
\nWhen we share what we have,
\neven if it is only a little,
\nwhen we give of our time,
\neven when we are incredibly busy,
\nor lonely, or tired,
\nthen the community sees the resurrected Christ
\nin our actions,
\nand we become signs of faith in our woundedness.<\/p>\n
\nAmy,
\nin her struggles to get used to living without feet,
\nwent on to found a non-profit organization for people with physical disabilities,
\nand she worked with another charity to bring shoes to children in developing countries.
\nIn her woundedness
\nshe found a way to help.<\/p>\n
\nwhen we gather here for Eucharist,
\nwhen we could just as easily be sleeping in
\nor going on a hike
\nor watching TV.
\nWhen we choose to spend our time in thanksgiving
\nwith our parish community
\nwe become like Christ showing his wounds to Thomas.
\nWe come here broken, wounded,
\nand yet still grateful for our lives
\nand the graces we have received.<\/p>\n
\nAngelo\u2019s monumental project was to call the Second Vatican Council,
\nto gather all the bishops of the world
\nand renew the Church and her liturgy.<\/p>\n
\njust as it knows Karl as Karol Wotyla, Pope John Paul II.<\/p>\n
\nand even because of their wounds,
\nthey became signs of faith to the world.<\/p>\n
\nas these two wounded men
\nare canonized as saints.<\/p>\n
\nbecause they have seen the signs of faith
\nin the lives of St. John XXIII
\nand St. John Paul II.<\/p>\n
\nand sometimes they come from
\nsomeplace else.<\/p>\n
\nIt doesn\u2019t even end with the non-profit she founded.<\/p>\n
\nBut that\u2019s not how I heard about her.
\nI first saw Amy while I was flipping through TV channels last week
\nlooking for something to watch while I was grading papers for school.<\/p>\n
\nand there was Amy Purdy in a beautiful white dress,
\ndancing on her artificial feet.<\/p>\n
\nto the song \u201cShout\u201d by the Isley Brothers,
\ndancing a jive,
\nwhich, according to the judges, is the most difficult dance.
\nThere she was with artificial feet strapped to the bottoms of her legs,
\nkicking and swinging and leaping with joy
\nwhile the Isley brothers sang,
\n\u201cYou know you make me want to shout.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nwhen I saw that woman dancing on prosthetic feet.
\nIt was amazing to see a young woman with that kind of disability
\nperforming with such life and joy and exhilaration.<\/p>\n
\nbut that\u2019s the kind of joy and life and exhilaration
\nthat can inspire people to come to Christ,
\nthat can strengthen the faith of those of us who already know Christ.<\/p>\n
\nAnd isn\u2019t that the very definition of resurrection?
\nTo dance in our woundedness?<\/p>\n
\ndancing with life, dancing with exhilaration and joy
\nthere\u2019s something compelling in that,
\nsomething attractive and amazingly hopeful.<\/p>\n
\nIn our woundedness we are to dance, we are to shout with joy
\nbecause the Lord is risen.
\nAnd it is through his wounds
\nThat he has healed us.<\/p>\n
\nuse our wounds to be signs of faith
\nand bring Easter joy to the world.<\/p>\n