Thursday in the Octave of Easter
Jesus understands that touch is important to us as human beings, perhaps as important as food for our survival. Sadly, it is known that if an infant is fed but does not receive touch on a regular basis, he or she will not thrive. As mammals, we have been created, biologically, to feed our offspring through the mother’s body; breastfeeding requires physical contact. And the desire to share a meal with our family, with friends, seems to remain even once we are capable of feeding ourselves.
Today’s post-resurrection gospel reading (Luke 24: 35-48) begins with two of the disciples recounting to the others how Jesus was “made known to them in the breaking of the bread” when they encountered him on the road to Emmaus (detailed in yesterday’s gospel). While they are sharing this with the others, Jesus appears to them and they are “startled and terrified” thinking that they are seeing a ghost. Jesus greets them with “Peace be with you,” and reassures them that it is not a ghost they’re seeing, but the risen Jesus in flesh and bone. He invites them, “touch me and see,” showing them his hands and feet. And then asks for something to eat. He eats a piece of fish in front of them as further evidence that his body is resurrected; they are not just seeing a spirit. Jesus asks for physical touch and food, knowing that this is what the disciples need to know that it is truly he, the Jesus that they had eaten with and walked and talked with and whose crucifixion they witnessed. How overwhelming, and joyous, and even confusing it must have been!
The gospel writer then tells us that Jesus “opened their minds to understand the scriptures.” The disciples finally begin to understand all that has happened and the prophecies that have been fulfilled in Jesus. And now, as Jesus points out “You are witnesses of these things,” they have a responsibility, they are being commissioned for their future ministry. They have a story to tell, good news to share, repentance and forgiveness to preach in Jesus’ name.
The first reading, taken from the Act of the Apostles (Acts 3: 11-26), takes us ahead to after Pentecost when the disciples are doing just that. Filled with the Holy Spirit, they are preaching and healing in Jesus’ name. They are sharing what they had been witnesses to.
Now jumping ahead two thousand years, the question comes to mind: What have I witnessed of Jesus’ resurrection, of Jesus’ presence in my life and the lives of those I’m close to. Don’t we, too, have a responsibility to share what we have witnessed of Jesus’ love and forgiveness and triumph over death? That more than two thousand years later He is still alive?!
Would a friend or stranger recognize Jesus in the breaking of bread in our homes? By our healing touch? While we’re still in the liturgical Octave of Easter, let us take time to pray and reflect on how we are being called to bear witness to the risen Christ in our own lives: in our homes, in our work, in our relationships with those we know and those we don’t know, and in our relationship with the earth that the risen Jesus once walked on.
Eileen Miller