Holy Week and Easter are very bodily feasts of our faith. On Maundy Thursday we are invited to wash each other’s feet. On Good Friday we had an opportunity to venerate, that is, kiss the cross, as a means of honoring the body of the crucified Jesus. On Easter we must contend with Jesus’ bodily resurrection. From Maundy Thursday to Easter morning our faith is being tested and each of us are challenged at different times and in different ways. Yet for all of us it is a faith that cannot be fully experienced without a deep and intimate connection with our own bodies. Yes, it is a paradox of faith.
To believe in Jesus’ resurrection, we must first walk in our own bodies and believe we are made in the image and likeness of God. The journey of our faith draws us from initial contempt for our bodies to being transformed by washing another’s feet, kissing the crucified body and ultimately believing in the resurrected body and life everlasting.
Thomas the apostle was a believer before Jesus’ death, but with Jesus’ resurrection he and we are being called into a deeper level of faith. Thomas was unprepared for Jesus’ resurrection. Apart from the beautiful pageantry of the Easter celebrations are we any better than Thomas? Do we really believe in the words of the Nicene Creed? “I believe in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting”?
We know from the Emmaus Gospel story that some of the disciples did not recognize Jesus until he made breakfast for them. The story goes that they recognized him in the breaking of the bread. Our story this morning tells us that Thomas did not believe until he could place his finger in Jesus’ wound. Where are you in your journey of faith? Do you empathize with Thomas’ story?
There is a wonderful painting done by the Italian painter, Caravaggio called “The Incredulity of Saint Thomas”. As I read today’s Gospel several times I also looked at this painting to see what more I could learn about this text. Initially, the painting struck me as odd with these men all staring at Jesus’ open side. I wondered how Thomas’ examination of Jesus’ wound was going to help him believe.
When I placed myself in this painting I was profoundly moved by the privilege of touching Jesus’ body. As I touched his body I thought about the healing touch of doctors. I thought of the many times I have visited the dying at their bedside and prayed with their families when I was a Chaplain. I also thought of the time I worked as a nurse’s aide at a hospice in NYC as part of my formation to be a priest.
As a nurse’s aide at the hospice I bathed, dressed, fed and diapered the dying. When people died I dressed their bodies for the morgue. Dressing the body really means undressing the body, washing it down, rubbing it with oil and covering with a sheet for the undertaker. Initially I was horrified by the expectation that I would dress the body. One nurse’s aide told me to care for the dead like I care for myself. She asked me, how do you wash your own body? She said you must care for their bodies as you care for your own. If you are afraid of your living body you will be afraid of their dead bodies. If you love your body, you will cherish the body of the man you bathed yesterday who today is dead.
In time I moved beyond my horror of touching a dead body. I began to recall the person’s family and their last words to each other. As this happened I moved from my own bodily fears of touching a dead body to cherishing the person whom I had bathed just a few days before. Each time I went through this process of transformation moving from my fear of a dead body to recalling the person to sensing the privilege of this intimate and holy moment. Of all the jobs I have had in my life this was without doubt the most meaningful one for me on the deepest level. This experience of caring for the body is one that I am confident that doctors and nurses in this congregation are quite familiar with too. As adult caregivers some of you may have had the experience of caring for your parents’ frail bodies with Alzheimer’s or cancer.
Thomas is looking at Jesus’ wound but he is not looking at Jesus. We might have greater empathy for Thomas if we enter this scene also. So this morning I invite you to meet Jesus in this scene and if you wish to touch his wound. How does such an invitation strike you? Do you feel timid, cautious, fearful or at all hesitant? Do you sense yourself moving towards Jesus? Do you directly look at him or do you stare at his wound? How long will it be before you place your finger into Jesus’ wound? Are your hands trembling as you touch him? Is the wound clean or messy? Do you even think about the condition of the wound? Do you readily place your finger in Jesus’ side or are you squeamish about touching possibly some dried blood?
What are you doing with you other hand? I was struck by the way Thomas has placed his finger in Jesus’ wound. But do you also see in the painting how Thomas has his other hand on almost exactly the same side of his own body as he does on Jesus’ body? As I looked at the painting I found myself looking at Thomas’ left hand placed firmly on his own side as much as I was drawn into the extension of his right hand to Jesus’ body.
Do you see that Jesus’ body is fully engaged in Thomas’ examination? Jesus pulls his cloak back with his right hand revealing his wound. And it appears his other hand is placed on Thomas. Perhaps Thomas is trembling and Jesus is helping him hold his hand still enough to touch the wound. As you know my hands tremble and people often have to help me steady my hand at certain times.
Look closer now and you will see that all eyes are on Jesus’ wound, but Thomas’ eye seems to look beyond Jesus. My sense is that there is far more to the story of Thomas than just his doubt and inability to believe in Jesus. Perhaps like the disciples at Emmaus who did not believe until they saw Jesus in the breaking of the bread, Thomas must first do something in order to recognize Jesus. Thomas says all he must do is touch Jesus to believe, but this painting does not convey a story of a believing Thomas.
Yet Thomas at least in Caravaggio’s painting averts his eyes from Jesus’ wounded body. I wonder what is going on in Thomas’ life. Clearly Thomas appears distracted. He is in front of Jesus and he is distracted looking away. I turn back to Thomas’ left hand and wonder if his hand and eyes might serve as clues leading us to a deeper meaning behind his story. I wonder if Thomas is distracted by his own concerns. Is it possible that Thomas’ own body hurts? All look at Jesus’ wound, even Jesus looks at Jesus’ wound, but Thomas, he looks away. Of all the men in the scene, Thomas looks the most frail. Is it possible that Thomas is ill?
A friend of mine at seminary, who for this sermon I will call Bill, was HIV positive. He was an African-American who was very articulate about the times he was the recipient of racism on various occasions throughout his life. This fellow was a great preacher and loved the ministry. He started his own church before he was 20 years old. Then in his late forties after his church flourished he went to seminary to get a Masters of Divinity.
He was famous for telling fellow classmates that Jesus is dead. He would say the stories of Jesus are great, but he is dead, oh so very dead. Jesus did not rise from the dead. He would laugh, and just keep saying, no Jesus is dead. All his closest friends were shocked when he would say this too. When I read this morning’s text and saw Caravaggio’s painting, I thought about Bill and remembered his story.
Bill’s story and Caravaggio’s painting help me hear the story of Thomas differently. I wonder if like the disciples at Emmaus who believed when they saw Jesus in the breaking of the bread, if Bill will see and believe only when his own body ceases to serve as a distraction. To what extent has Bill’s HIV or even racism served to condemn his body? Can the condemned body really believe in Jesus? Can Bill believe in Jesus’ bodily resurrection?
I wonder if a little bit of Bill’s story might be also be a part of Thomas’ story and our own stories too. Can Thomas really see, touch and believe Jesus while his own body causes him shame or even hurts? What about us? Do the wounds of our own bodies impede us from looking directly at Jesus’ wound? Do we touch Jesus’ wound like a healing doctor or as a lover does or are we distracted by our own wounds, turning away in shame, anger or self-condemnation?
Some will recognize Jesus in the breaking of the bread like the disciples at Emmaus did. Some of us will only recognize Jesus when we have recognized our embodied selves as Jesus own beloved. I think when we see ourselves as very members incorporate of the Body of Christ, sharing in the story of our salvation, specifically in Jesus’ resurrection that we will be able to say, Jesus, you are Lord.
Until then Jesus abides with us as we move from a place of distraction to when we are ready to encounter Jesus face to face. Until then Jesus pulls back his cloak to reveal his most intimate self and he steadies our trembling hands so that even when we are too fearful to look we may still touch his wound.
Do we see our wounds as means that bring us into greater communion with God or are our wounds distractions from the deepest expression of our Easter faith? Like the nurse aide who instructed me some twenty years ago, my advice to you today is to love your body as God’s own. As we paradoxically love our human bodies and those of our neighbors we then may be able to look directly at Jesus, touch his wound and believe in his divinity manifested through the resurrection.
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