by Father John P. Cush, STD
On this second Sunday of Easter, also known as Divine Mercy Sunday, the Church places before us the face of the risen Christ, shining with mercy, and his first words to the fearful apostles: “Peace be with you.”
He does not begin with reproach. He does not chide Peter for his denial, or the others for their flight. He enters into the locked room and offers shalom — peace — the deep biblical peace that heals what is broken, restores what is lost, and binds together what has been shattered.
St. Augustine defines peace not simply as the absence of struggle, but as the “tranquillitas ordinis” — the tranquility of order (De Civitate Dei, XIX.13). That is, peace is the harmony that comes when all things are rightly ordered — when the soul is ordered toward God, and love reigns.
The apostles are not yet at peace internally. They are behind locked doors, consumed by fear and shame. But the peace Christ brings is not a feeling. It is a gift, a divine reality rooted in His victory over sin and death.
St. Thomas Aquinas, in his “Summa Theologiae,” teaches that peace is the work of justice, and it is especially the fruit of charity (ST II-II, q. 29, a. 3).
Peace, for Aquinas, is not merely passive — it is the inner stability that comes from rightly ordered love. And because Christ, in His passion and resurrection, has restored the right order between humanity and God, he alone can say, in truth: “Peace be with you.” Strikingly, when Jesus says “Peace,” he immediately shows them his wounds (John 20:20).
The glorified Christ does not erase the marks of His suffering. They remain — not as reminders of defeat, but as emblems of love.
The 20th century theologian, Hans Urs von Balthasar, reflects that the risen Christ bears his wounds not as scars, but as open signs of divine mercy. These wounds are now the wellsprings of peace, because they reveal the cost of redemption and the depth of love. The same hands that were nailed to the cross now bestow the Holy Spirit and the mission of forgiveness.
This Sunday is also Divine Mercy Sunday, a title given to the second Sunday of Easter by Pope St. John Paul II, following the mystical revelations of St. Faustina Kowalska. In Christ’s appearance to the apostles, we see mercy embodied. He steps into fear with forgiveness. He transforms doubt with presence. He replaces shame with peace.
And then there is Thomas. He is absent at first, and when told of the Lord’s appearance, he demands to see and touch. But when Jesus returns, He meets Thomas not with anger, but with an invitation: “Put your finger here … do not be unbelieving, but believe” (John 20:27).
Thomas responds not with a theological analysis, but with the deepest confession of faith in the Gospel: “My Lord and my God.” This is not merely an acknowledgment that Jesus is alive. It is a recognition that in the wounds, in the mercy, in the peace, stands God Himself, risen and reigning.
As Aquinas would later declare in his Eucharistic hymn: “Plagas sicut Thomas non intueor, Deum tamen meum te confiteor.”
“Though I do not see the wounds of Thomas, I confess You to be my God.”
Peter tells us in today’s second reading: “Although you have not seen Him, you love Him. … You rejoice with an indescribable and glorious joy, as you attain the goal of your faith — the salvation of your souls” (1 Peter 1:8–9).
That is our Easter calling: to live in this peace, to be shaped by this mercy, to proclaim this joy. In a world anxious and divided, we are called to carry the wounds of Christ as bearers of his peace.
We are not just recipients of mercy — we are now instruments of mercy. We are sent, just as the apostles were, into a broken world, to speak the words the risen Christ still speaks: “Peace be with you.”
Dear brothers and sisters,
Let the peace of the risen Lord dwell in your hearts.
Let the wounds of Christ be your strength.
Let the mercy of God be your mission.
Let the confession of Thomas be your own: “My Lord and my God.”
And go forth as Easter people:
Not only to believe in peace, but to live it.
Not only to receive mercy, but to show it.
Not only to rejoice in the resurrection, but to embody it.
Christ is risen! He is truly risen! Alleluia!
Father John P. Cush, STD, is professor of dogmatic and fundamental theology at Saint Joseph’s Seminary and College