John 20:24-29
Experiencing doubts about your faith is a common experience. Sometimes people have difficulty believing in
the existence of God. Others are
uncertain about whether Jesus Christ is truly God. There are also those who struggle to accept
various teachings proposed by the Church.
Today we celebrate the feast of St. Thomas, often called “Doubting
Thomas”. He is something like the patron
saint of those who doubt. By looking at
His life we can discover an important lesson about the role of doubt in the
life of Christians.
From the Gospel we learn that Jesus is there to support
us when we experience doubts. When we
struggle with disbelief, Christ will always be there to help us, to help lead
us back to belief in Him. Initially Thomas
doubted the Resurrection. When the
Apostles told Thomas that they had seen the Risen Christ, he doubts it. He says
he cannot believe it unless he sees it with his own eyes. The interesting thing is that Thomas keeps
searching. Though he has doubts he
continues to spend time with the Apostles.
Thomas does not walk away. Because Thomas keeps searching, Jesus has an
opportunity to reveal Himself to Thomas, to show Thomas the holes in His hands,
feet and side. Likewise when we
experience doubt it is important for us to continue searching. We should never give up when we experience
doubts. When we do this Christ will work
in our life to satisfy our struggles with the faith. He can do this in many different ways. For example, if we have difficulty believing
in the existence of God, perhaps through the beauty of a sunset we will be
convinced that there must be a loving God who created this. Or if we are struggling with a particular
teaching of the Church, through a conversation with somebody or through a book
that we may read, the issue may all of a sudden “click” in our mind, it may
make sense like it never has before. As
long as we continue to search for the truth when we experience doubt, Jesus
will eventually satisfy our doubts as He did for Thomas.
After experiencing struggles in our faith it is possible
to become a great follower of Jesus Christ.
Once our doubt has turned to belief we can become a more fervent and
effective follower of Jesus Christ than before.
In the Gospel we see this already with St. Thomas. After Jesus appeared to Thomas, Thomas
proclaims what is one of the strongest declarations of faith in the New
Testament: “my Lord and my God”. After
the Ascension of Jesus, Thomas went on to become a great missionary. Ancient tradition tells us that St. Thomas
travelled through the Middle East and eventually settled in India. All along the way Thomas spread the Good News
of Jesus Christ. Many Christians in
India call themselves “Thomas Christians” because they recognize that their
faith came to them through Thomas. I
think that Thomas was so great a missionary because he himself had first
struggled with doubt. This made him
better suited to tell other people about the Resurrection of Jesus, people who
would also experience doubt about the whole idea. We find a modern day equivalent in Jacques
Maritain, a great French philosopher who passed away in 1973. As a university student, Maritain struggled
to believe in God. One day his life
changed forever when he heard a lecture by the philosopher Henri Bergson. He was convinced that absolute truth does
indeed exist and eventually entered the Catholic Church. Maritain went on to become a great
philosopher, defending belief in God and the Christian worldview. Maritain was
able to do such a great job defending the faith to those who were skeptical
because he himself had first experienced doubts in his own journey. His life shows that once our doubt has turned
to belief we can become a more fervent and effective follower of Jesus Christ
than before.
At different times we will all probably struggle with
doubt and uncertainty in our faith. As
long as we continue to search for truth in the midst of our doubt, Jesus will eventually
make things clear to us. Today let us
commit ourselves to never stop searching for the truth when we struggle with
doubts about our faith.
