The Risen Jesus And Doubting Thomas

(Please note the names mentioned in this sermon are pseudonyms)

Today, we have this story of Jesus physically appearing to his disciples after his resurrection. On Jesus’ first appearance, Thomas was absent, and we just read in the story that he had insisted on seeing Jesus’ wounds if he were to believe what his fellow disciples had witnessed.

A week later, Jesus once again appears to the disciples, with Thomas too present. Jesus, having known Thomas's reservation, shows him his wounds and invites him to feel them. John’s Gospel avoids saying whether Thomas physically examined Jesus’ wounded hands before declaring: “My Lord and my God!”

Jesus asserted the superiority of those who have faith without physical evidence. Nonetheless, because he was willing to show Thomas his wounds and let him feel them, I believe that Thomas did feel Jesus’ wounds. (Many Biblical scholars subscribe to this belief).

Whether Thomas touched the wounds or not, the fact that Jesus was willing to show his wounds to Thomas makes us ask: “Why wasn’t Jesus' pain and woundedness finished when he died on Good Friday?” My experience thirty-three years ago in NZ has helped me reflect on and answer this question. I want to share this experience with you.

The experience relates to a lovely young woman God brought to my life in the parish I served thirty-three years ago. I was an Assistant Priest at the time. This gorgeous girl's name was Assumpta.

When I met Assumpta, she was twenty-four years old and in the prime of her life. She had completed a fashion course and worked as a fashion industry model. She was one of the prettiest girls I had met. Her father was Irish, and her mother was Greek. She had Dark hair, olive skin, and deep green eyes with long eyelashes. She had the perfect figure to be a model. She was eight months into her modelling career.

One day, she called me panicked and asked whether I would see her urgently at the church office. We arranged to meet in the afternoon when she contacted me. After talking for a while, I felt she was pretty uneasy about what she had come to tell me. After talking for a while, she picked up her courage. She told me, "Father, this is not the kind of a thing you may get to hear from your average parishioner, but I have no one to tell what I have discovered. I cannot tell my parents just now, or Mark” – her fiancée she was due to marry later that year. The engagement ceremony of Mark and Assumpta was the first formal event I witnessed, and I was blessed after I’d been ordained a priest three days ago.

Assumpta started to cry uncontrollably and said: “Father, I had discovered an unusual lump in the side of my left breast three weeks ago. I first ignored it because I had worn a very tight bra for a modelling event and thought it was caused by it. But it didn’t go away, and I had to see my doctor, who referred me to a specialist. Two days ago, I took a mammogram, and it has been confirmed that I have stage two breast cancer.” She started sobbing and said: “I am twenty-five, working as a model and engaged to a man to marry soon; what is my future? Will prayer heal me? Will you anoint me for healing, and will you come and be with me when I have to tell my parents and Mark about this?”

I said, “Assumpta, of course, I will pray for you, anoint you, be with you when you break the news to your parents and Mark, and journey with you, shouldering whatever Jesus wants me to bear for you with him.” After talking for a long time, we agreed to see the parents and Mark as early as possible and share her news.

We did that, and in great agony and pain, Assumpta resigned from her modelling job and started treatment. She had two invasive surgeries, which didn’t prove successful, and after eighteen months, a mastectomy. Considering her age and the extent to which the cancer had spread, to ensure her survival, both her breasts were removed.

The day Assumpta informed the company of her illness, her contract was terminated. In addition to the last nominal and casual salary the company paid her (NZ$1,250 for a month), she was paid NZ$175 for a women’s undergarment she’d modelled for.

No matter how successful the surgeries were to remove the life-threatening cancer, which were successful, her body was never to be “normal” again. No matter how good the surgeons and the plastic surgeons were, her body was never as it was before the mastectomy. For her, the pain and struggle didn’t last just a few hours or days, and then it was over. It was a very long and painful struggle. It was so painful for her and for all those who loved her to see her disfiguring as a result of aggressive chemotherapy. I sat through five consecutive fortnightly chemo-therapy sessions to support her. The lustre of her beautiful face receded after the first week of chemotherapy. And, I wept privately each time I’d seen her over those fortnights for seeing someone so beautiful withering away and reducing into a mere skeleton.