When Jesus explains to the twelve that Lazarus has died and wants to go to him, Thomas says to the other disciples: "Let us also go to die with him.". Love for Jesus impels him, but he is too sure of his will, he does not know that he is not capable without God's help. When Jesus is captured, he becomes afraid and flees like everyone else. And leaves him alone to his fate.
After the death and burial of Jesus, the others meet again in the cenacle, with Mary. But Thomas is not there. He has had a deeper crisis and has moved away. Dazed by the events and by the collapse of his intention to die with Jesus. That night in the Garden of Olives: "It's me."Jesus said, and the soldiers fell to the ground. He could win, and yet he allowed himself to be captured. All is lost. A sense of total defeat takes hold of him, the impression of having lost his ideals, his life, himself. The only thing that counts is saving his own skin. He loses faith in the words of Christ. The promised resurrection after death is an illusion, what counts are the facts seen: the tragedy of the torture; and heard: the cry of the cross. It is all over.
However, Jesus rises on the first day of the week and appears to the apostles in the upper room. But there were only ten, Thomas was not there, who knows where he had gone. Jesus entrusts him to the haste of the others. They look for him and find him, but Thomas is hard-headed: he is burned by Jesus' failure in front of the people, by his own escape, by not having been there that evening, by the feeling of having been left out. He becomes obstinate and does not want to believe without having seen.
Your intervention is necessary, Jesus, still one. Jesus listens to the silent prayer of Mary, the desire of Peter, the heart of John. He goes to them after eight days, behind closed doors. "Thomas, the time has come for your mind and heart to change too. Do not be unbelieving, be a believer. Put your hand in here, to experience the truth and the strength of my resurrected flesh. It is my body given for you and it is my blood poured out for you, from which you will be nourished in the Eucharist. It is my wounded hand, which you yourself will impose on the heads of so many to cancel sins and heal the sick of the spirit".
Thomas does what Jesus tells him to do, for himself and for us. He does what we would all like to do: touch with his hand. Those wounds of Jesus that with the resurrection have not disappeared, they are always fresh, contemporary, alive. Happy are we who meet him, without seeing him, if we see him in our brothers, in the Church, his body. Thomas touches Jesus, who shines with the greatest and purest faith: "My Lord and my God!". Act of faith, pain and love.
