Dear Friends,
Last week in my homily, I speculated that Thomas wanted to make sure that the Jesus who was appearing to the disciples in the resurrection was the same Jesus who had died on the cross, that Thomas needed to see the wounds, not Jesus’ face or voice, but the wounds. This Sunday’s gospel in Luke follows up with a similar theme where Jesus says to the disciples, “Look at my hands and feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see…”. In preparing the homily for today, I ran across a poem, Jesus of the Scars, written in 1917 by Edward Shillito, a pastor and poet in England, who was experiencing the scars and pain of World War I. Here is the poem:
If we have never sought, we seek Thee now;
Thine eyes burn through the dark, our only stars;
We must have sight of thorn-pricks on Thy brow,
We must have Thee, O Jesus of the Scars.
The heavens frighten us; they are too calm;
In all the universe we have no place.
Our wounds are hurting us; where is the balm?
Lord Jesus, by Thy Scars, we claim Thy grace.
If, when the doors are shut, Thou drawest near,
Only reveal those hands, that side of Thine;
We know today what wounds are, have no fear,
Show us Thy Scars, we know the countersign.
The other gods were strong; but Thou wast weak;
They rode, but Thou didst stumble to a throne;
But to our wounds only God’s wounds can speak,
And not a god has wounds, but Thou alone.
Every scar tells a story. I have many that I have collected over the years of my life. Some are from childhood and others are from last week. They are the marks on my body from adventures great and small, from efforts by doctors to heal, and from accidents that happened in spite of my best efforts to avoid them.
I find it comforting to know that Jesus understands my scars. Perhaps I can sit down with Jesus when I get to heaven and we can share stories of our scars. Jesus’ wounds speak of comfort to me because he understands, but they also whisper hope. As we remembered his suffering during our Lent and Easter Seasons, we see purpose and power. We know the end of the story for these wounds, and they give us courage that our scars could one day mean more.
The wounds of Jesus speak of pain and triumph, battle and victory, sorrow and joy. His nail-scarred hands and wounded side speak of purpose and meaning. To our wounds, God’s wounds can speak. For no other God has entered into pain, death and sorrow to break their chains from within. No other God loved us enough to suffer. The invitation, today, from Jesus is there for each one of us, “touch me and see.”
Maybe you know of someone who is struggling today with their scars. Invite them to come to the one who knows what it’s like to stumble under a heavy load. Help them embrace the one who suffered, so that their pain is transformed. Let them walk with the one who crushes fear, because he has faced our greatest enemy, death itself, and won. Let his scars speak a better word.
Peace,
Fr. Damian