The Incredulity of Thomas: Eugene Girardet
The liturgical weight and solemnity of Holy Week is behind us but every Sunday is a "little Easter" and so it's time to begin reading, studying and pondering the scriptures for the Second Sunday of Easter, also known as Divine Mercy Sunday.
The scriptures for Sunday and background material on them can be found here and hints for helping children prepare this coming weekend's Word can be found here.
The first reading from the Acts of the Apostles gives us a snapshot view of the early Christian community and sets the bar high for those of us who would take it as our model.
In the Easter season, all three readings on Sunday are taken from the Christian scriptures, the only season in the Church year when the Hebrew scriptures are not part of our spiritual nourishment. I hope that some future revision of the lectionary might rethink this practice. So, we will hear from the First Letter of John and the question of who is begotten of God. The gospel is the witness of John and tell story of Thomas, the doubter. Embedded in this story is the Lord's word,"Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained," which is important for our understanding of the sacramental forgiveness of sin.
-ConcordPastor
...I DO believe, but...
ReplyDeleteI'm pretty sure that puts you with the majority, Michelle.
ReplyDeleteHaving just completed a course in church history, I am interested to hear and re-read Acts this Easter.
ReplyDeleteOne of the many gifts of having gone to daily mass for many years (something I can ironically not do with such ease now that I am back to work... at a church!), is to fall into the rhythm of readings and perhaps glimpse something I might have missed on Sundays alone.
So while I may not be able to be at mass, I read the Scriptures daily and have a button at the top of my blog which encourages access for others.
Might I add however, that I have always found the Sunday after Easter curious timing for Divine Mercy Sunday. I have not done the research to understand why this is timed in this way.
Can you shed some light on that?
Fran