Why the Church honours St Thomas despite his doubt
Is it possible that St Thomas' faults have been exaggerated over the centuries?
Is it possible that St Thomas' faults have been exaggerated over the centuries?
Editor’s Notes
In this Part, Fr. Coleridge tells us…
How Christ permitted the doubt of Thomas to elicit a deeper, firmer confession of faith
That divine Providence used one Apostle’s hesitation to confirm the faith of all the rest
Why blessedness belongs to those who believe without seeing, though their vision will come.
He shows us that Christ both corrects and crowns the soul that returns to him in humility and belief.
Easter Day
The Passage of Our Lord to the Father—Chapter XIV
St. Matt. xxviii. 2-15; St. Mark xvi. 2-13; St. Luke xxiv. 1-43; St. John xx. 1-29.
Story of the Gospels, § 173-177
Burns and Oates, London, 1892
What the risen Christ did when he met all the Apostles together
Easter’s lasting gift: Confession and the power of absolution
The incredulity of St Thomas
St. John lastly passes to a part of the history of this wonderful Easter Day, of which he is the only narrator—what is commonly called the incredulity of St. Thomas.
‘Now Thomas, one of the twelve, who is called Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples therefore said to him, We have seen the Lord. But he said to them, Except I shall see in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe.
‘And after eight days again His disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Jesus cometh, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be to you. Then He said to Thomas, Put in thy finger hither, and see My hands, and bring hither thy hand, and put it into My side; and be not faithless, but believing. Thomas answered, and said to Him, My Lord and my God!
‘Jesus saith to him, Because thou hast seen Me, Thomas, thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and have believed.’
Cause of his absence
The incident of the hesitation of St. Thomas seems to close the events of this first Easter Day in a very striking manner. We are not told what was the occasion of the absence of St. Thomas from the assembly of the Apostles, or whether he had kept away by accident, or indeed whether this was his first return to the company of the others. But it is not so easy to think that he had held aloof entirely from the holy company, or had only just returned from a distance, in which case he would have been a stranger to all that had already passed since the morning, and he asks no questions like one who was a stranger to all that had occurred, nor is he treated by the others as one who had been separated from them for any length of time.
He seems to know that the others had seen the marks in the hands and in the side, though perhaps they had not all examined them to the utmost. It might have been a great mark of ready credulity in Thomas if he had been ready and happy to believe on the evidence of the others, and then he would have had the praise of which our Lord spoke—the praise of being blessed beyond others, and requiring no special demonstrative proof beyond the word of the others—and we may feel sure that he would not have been left without this peculiar crown, which was thus within his reach, if he had not been inclined to stand out, as it were, for special proof of his own.
Grave faults laid to his charge
We see thus that the fall of St. Thomas—so to call it—consisted primarily in a failure to believe rather than any positive unbelief, and that, when the evidence on which the others had shown positive belief had not been forthcoming for him, St. Thomas failed when others might have done the same.
For it was in the order of Providence that he should yield to the temptation, which for a time separated him from the joy and blessedness in which his companions were bathed. And perhaps all this was arranged by our Lord, as has been remarked by some of the Fathers, that through St. Thomas might be brought about a fresh conviction to the truth of the Resurrection, by the conviction of one who had a fixed resolve against the credulity which had been shown by others, and thus ended by confirming the common belief of the Apostolate after having held out against it.
If all had believed like St. John, something might perhaps have been lacking, for then it might have been said that the evidence of the marks in our Lord’s hands and feet had hardly been tested to the utmost. The absence of St. Thomas when our Lord had appeared to them, might make him feel as if he had been left out, and then all the many motives for hesitation would begin to work upon him in his sorrow, and if there were in his heart any kind of disappointment at being placed below the others in what would have been so great a joy to him in seeing again our Blessed Lord, a kind of resentful feeling might take possession of him, and he might be wayward enough to resolve that this feeling of disappointment should be in a sort of way avenged in himself and others.
And we cannot tell that the temptation did not take the form of a sort of indignant and sullen feeling that he who had been dealt with less lovingly than others, should be found to be more difficult than all in giving way to the truth.
But… have St Thomas’ faults been exaggerated over the centuries?
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