The article highlighted how we Americans have moved well beyond the Cold War bunkers made of cinder blocks with shelves of canned beans. Today’s “panic industry” is selling sleek, high-end, climate-controlled fortresses outfitted with air filtration systems, solar panels, bullet proof doors, and enough dried food to last a year. They look more like luxury condos than survival shelters. And for seven million dollars, you can even get a moat.
Of course, the article wasn't really about the bunkers themselves, though. It was about us. It was about how more and more of us are investing in elaborate plans to hide ourselves from a threatening world.
What struck me most about this article was the fear. The term “panic industry” is exactly right. Stoking fear of catastrophe and collapse, and especially fear of one another, turns out to be good for business, and this is leading us from “love your neighbor” to “fear your neighbor.” From shared responsibility to fear-based, self-reliance. From community to isolation and retreat.
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The Gospel story also begins in panic mode — for we find the disciples terrified and locked inside a sealed-off room.
In today’s reading from the Gospel of John, we are told that the disciples are hiding behind shut doors in fear. As the fifth century writer Peter Chrysologus described it, the “terror and disquiet” caused by Jesus’ crucifixion had “locked the house and hearts of the disciples.” They bolted the doors, and drew the shades. Had the moat upgrade been available, I suspect they would have done that too.
And it is into that locked room that Jesus comes in a spirit of peace. “Peace be with you,” Jesus says. Not once, but twice. “Peace be with you.”
Jesus then shows them his wounds, the marks left by the crucifixion, a reminder of how the world inflicts its cruelty on the innocent. He then gives the disciples the Holy Spirit and sends them out of that locked room to preach a message of mercy and peace, of reconciliation and healing. He tells them: “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
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As important as all of that is, however, that first visitation is just the prelude to a reflection on doubt. For Jesus’ next appearance centers on the person of Thomas, the disciple who famously doubted the resurrection.
John’s Gospel does not mention where Thomas was when the first appearance occurred. Perhaps he was out buying supplies. Either way, when the other disciples tell him “We have seen the Lord,” he isn’t convinced. Still trapped in the night of disquiet and terror, with his “mind darkened by the somber cloud of grief and sadness”, Thomas cannot accept the possibility of resurrection. “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands,” he says, “and place my finger in his side, I will not believe.”
And this — this moment — is where we all come in. Because the truth is we are all Thomas.
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It is rare to find something that both modern day biblical scholars and ancient church commentaries nearly unanimously agree on, but nearly everything I read in preparation for this sermon was united around the idea that we are Thomas, and Thomas is us.
For like Thomas, we were not in the safe room that first Easter evening. Like Thomas, we did not get to see the risen Jesus with our own eyes. Like Thomas, we have to rely on the testimony of others, including the four witnesses of the Gospels. And like Thomas, especially in times of grief, anxiety, and fear, we may struggle to trust that testimony. Just this past Friday, I had dinner with a friend who asked - gently - how I could believe in the Resurrection with so much war and violence in the world. It was a very honest question. And I confess: sometimes it’s hard.
Like Thomas, we want more, don’t we? We want to see, to touch, to know. We want certainty.
While I don’t think this fully answers my friend’s question, what I know - for certain - is that life becomes smaller, meaner, and narrower when all it is rooted in is cynicism and fear, and I have personally seen how life becomes larger, more creative, expansive, loving and courageous by being grounded in the hope of the Resurrection. I believe / that cruelty and death are not the final word / that the light shines on in the darkness / and that darkness will not overcome it.
In the end, of course, the resurrected Jesus does come and visit doubting Thomas. Once again, Jesus breaches the locked room. “Peace be with you,” he says. He doesn’t rebuke Thomas for his doubt. He invites him to see, to touch, to believe. And Thomas responds with one of the most powerful declarations of faith in the Gospel of John: “My Lord and my God!” Afterward Jesus says: “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”
This story is an invitation to belief. You are invited to believe that the Resurrection is God’s response to a world locked inside a night of grief and terror. It is God’s way of breaking in and calling us out, out into a hurting world with a message of mercy, healing, and peace.
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I’d like to offer one final thought before closing today. Earlier this week, on Monday, the world awoke to the news of Pope Francis’ death. In the days that followed, I read many tributes about him, as well as many of his own words. I was especially struck by his final Easter message, given just the day before he died. There Pope Francis stated:
“The light of Easter impels us to break down the barriers that create division and are fraught with grave political and economic consequences…I appeal to all those in positions of political responsibility in our world not to yield to the logic of fear which only leads to isolation from others, but rather to use the resources available to help the needy, to fight hunger, and to encourage initiatives that promote development. These are the ‘weapons of peace,’ weapons that help to build the future, instead of sowing the seeds of death.”In a world that feels trapped in a night of grief and terror, in a nation where a third of the population is prepping for a doomsday scenario, I pray we remember this Gospel story, for this is a story of locked rooms breached by God’s hope and love, a story of doubt met by grace, and a story of fearful disciples transformed into bearers of Good News. I pray that we will “not yield to the logic of fear which only leads to isolation from others,” but rather may come to believe and heed Jesus’ call to love our neighbors and proclaim a Gospel of mercy, peace, and healing.
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