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Second Sunday of Easter
Sunday of Divine Mercy
12 April 2026
A new birth to a living hope
Acts 2:42-47
They devoted themselves
to the teaching of the apostles and to the communal life,
to the breaking of bread and to the prayers.
Awe came upon everyone,
and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles.
All who believed were together and had all things in common;
they would sell their property and possessions
and divide them among all according to each one’s need.
Every day they devoted themselves
to meeting together in the temple area
and to breaking bread in their homes.
They ate their meals with exultation and sincerity of heart,
praising God and enjoying favor with all the people.
And every day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved.
R. Give thanks to the Lord for he is good, his love is everlasting.
or: R. Alleluia.
Let the house of Israel say,
“His mercy endures forever.”
Let the house of Aaron say,
“His mercy endures forever.”
Let those who fear the Lord say,
“His mercy endures forever.”
I was hard pressed and was falling,
but the Lord helped me.
My strength and my courage is the Lord,
and he has been my savior.
The joyful shout of victory
in the tents of the just:
The stone which the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone.
By the Lord has this been done;
it is wonderful in our eyes.
This is the day the Lord has made;
let us be glad and rejoice in it.
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who in his great mercy gave us a new birth to a living hope
through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading,
kept in heaven for you
who by the power of God are safeguarded through faith,
to a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the final time.
In this you rejoice, although now for a little while
you may have to suffer through various trials,
so that the genuineness of your faith,
more precious than gold that is perishable even though tested by fire,
may prove to be for praise, glory, and honor
at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Although you have not seen him you love him;
even though you do not see him now yet believe in him,
you rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy,
as you attain the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.
On the evening of that first day of the week,
when the doors were locked, where the disciples were,
for fear of the Jews,
Jesus came and stood in their midst
and said to them, “Peace be with you.”
When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side.
The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord.
Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you.
As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them,
“Receive the Holy Spirit.
Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them,
and whose sins you retain are retained.”
Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve,
was not with them when Jesus came.
So the other disciples said to him, “We have seen the Lord.”
But he said to them,
“Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands
and put my finger into the nailmarks
and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”
Now a week later his disciples were again inside
and Thomas was with them.
Jesus came, although the doors were locked,
and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you.”
Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and see my hands,
and bring your hand and put it into my side,
and do not be unbelieving, but believe.”
Thomas answered and said to him, “My Lord and my God!”
Jesus said to him, “Have you come to believe because you have seen me?
Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.”
Now, Jesus did many other signs in the presence of his disciples
that are not written in this book.
But these are written that you may come to believe
that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God,
and that through this belief you may have life in his name.
When we read the Scriptures at Eucharist it is not only for the Word of God to be heard, let alone just to be read, with or without anyone listening. The idea is that the gathered community should see itself as actually involved in the action that is being described.
So today, we are not to stand back and critique this account of Thomas' doubting, assessing whether it is historical fact or a made-up story, judging whether it is likely to have happened or utterly improbable, and so on. We see ourselves in that room among the twelve.
Perhaps we're watching Thomas, a little amused at his embarrassment. Or perhaps I see myself as Thomas actually standing in his shoes, honestly protesting my doubt. "I need proof," I declare. "If I can touch him I might be convinced he's real, but it more likely you've all suffered an hallucination of some sort."
It's a valid point. Can we ever believe something just on the word of another? Testing is normal practice in science. In our Christian faith we all depend on the testimony of those who have gone before us. We trust that they have passed on the facts faithfully in the Scriptures and Teachings. We find confirmation of our trust in the long history of the Christianity, marked as it is with constant watchfulness, debates and divisions in a tireless effort to hold all the truth together.
But many are not convinced with arguments based on the authority of the Church when that same Church has had such a bad run of scandals and corruption over the ages. A lot of people don't trust the Church any more. Maybe neither should I!
I need something in the here and now, something tangible that we know is real. And I believe that is what we have - in the community of believers gathered around in this room this very morning. It's not that they would tell you exactly what it is they believe, nor what makes them so sure. Most won't be very good at talking about it all, but you will see their conviction in their whole demeanour. These are real people, neighbours in fact, and friends, relatives, workmates. Individually you might wonder what they believe in, but seeing them all together in this crowded church, showing their piety in different ways, sometimes idiosyncratic but without selfconsciousness, sometimes just so deeply serious you would not dream of questioning it.
In this community of believers we touch the Christ. We join willingly with them in lifting our hands to offer gifts to God in prayer. We bow in humble supplication, and today our first prayer might well be: "Lord, I do believe. Lord, help my unbelief."
Bless me with your strength to speak and act out there, at work or down the street or in the political rally. To speak up for the truth when that is called for. There's a lot of twisted facts and straight out lies being spread around today, the worst of them destroying peoples' lives and ripping apart the very fabric of society. The truth is in desperate need for strong defenders who will speak out and challenge the lies. And in that we need to remember that our side is not always the right side.
*****
There's something else to consider today. It is raised by St Peter in his letter cited in the second reading. It is the not-so-small matter of hope. Peter says that the rising of Jesus from the dead gave us "a new birth to a living hope."
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who in his great mercy gave us a new birth to a living hope
through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
Takes your breath away, that language! I imagine that if we asked any one of the people in your Sunday congregation about their faith, we would get some kind of an answer. But if we asked them: "Do you really hope things will all work out for the best, given the way things go in the world and the experience you've had so far through your life?" i think we might get a surprise.
Deep down, I don't find a powerful hope supporting my efforts. It's one thing not to look for results because we must leave that to God, and we do see improvements in society over the long term, but deep down I expect things to be pretty much the same as I leave this world as when I entered it. Oh, we do things better, and we've developed a lot of ways to make life more liveable - education, health, public administration, even international relations, but individually we re still the same, still prone to the same self-deception, vanity, greed, and failure to love the one beside us.
Yet here is Peter, the Rock, declaring that by his resurrection Jesus has given us a new birth in a living hope. Leaving out the big words, that means that God, the Creator and Father, means us all to reach that stage of resurrection in a new dimension of being. We call it "Heaven". being "with God", seeing the marvelous mysterious Spirit "face to face".
Most of our generation were brought up with the highest ambition being to escape hell and get out off purgatory as quick as we could. Perhaps today we might just read these line from Peter's letter over and over a few times and let some of the ideas take hold. It is, after all, the deliberate intention of God, in his infinite mercy, to bring this creation to its fullness.
A new birth to a living hope
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who in his great mercy gave us a new birth to a living hope
through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead,
to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading,
kept in heaven for you
who by the power of God are safeguarded through faith,
to a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the final time.
In this you rejoice, although now for a little while
you may have to suffer through various trials,
so that the genuineness of your faith,
more precious than gold that is perishable even though tested by fire,
may prove to be for praise, glory, and honor
at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
Although you have not seen him you love him;
even though you do not see him now yet believe in him,
you rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy,
as you attain the goal of your faith, the salvation of your souls.