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.” – John 20:27
We each have wounds—wounds that have healed, wounds that are still healing, wounds that are still fresh and sore. In a mysterious way, being wounded is part of the human condition (CCC 405). Jesus became man precisely so He could enter into our human suffering. He truly can “sympathize with our weaknesses” (Hebrews 4:15).
In God’s immense mercy, He endured the wounds of His Passion in order to save us and heal us from our woundedness. Isaiah wrote, “The whole head is sick, the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot to the head there is no sound spot in it; Just bruise and welt and oozing wound, not drained, or bandaged, or eased with salve” (1:5-6). Jesus is the salve that heals all our wounds: “But he was pierced for our sins, crushed for our iniquity. He bore the punishment that makes us whole, by his wounds we were healed” (Isaiah 53:5).
I’ve recently been healing from a personal wound of the heart. In prayer, Jesus invited me to unite my wounds with His own. He has taken this hurt from my heart into His own Body. Perhaps this is what Thomas à Kempis meant when he wrote, “If you can not soar up as high as Christ sitting on his throne, behold him hanging on his cross. Rest in Christ’s Passion and live willingly in his wounds” (The Imitation of Christ). That wound of my heart now lives in Him as He lives in me (cf. Galatians 2:20).
Seeing and touching Christ’s wounds filled the disciples with faith and joy (see John 20:20; 28). Why is this? When we see the wounds of Christ, we see the visible proof of His Resurrection and our salvation. We see the wounds that heal us. This is the paschal joy that we express with awe and thanksgiving: Alleluia, He is Risen!
Jesus, Your love and mercy leaves me in awe. Hide me in Your wounds. Let me abide with You there.
