Saint Thomas the Apostle, better known as “the unbeliever” and whose feast day the Catholic Church celebrates this July 3, is presented in the Gospels saying words and phrases at moments that seem inopportune, but that made Christ reveal his divine power.
1. “To die with Christ!”
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San Juan, in his Gospelnarrates that Jesus found out that Lazarus, his friend, was sick and after two days he told his disciples that it was time to return to Judea.
They fearfully asked him if he really wanted to go there because the Jews had wanted to stone him. But Christ tells them that Lazarus had died and that they should go see him.
Thomas, despite his fear of the Jews and seeking to support Jesus, said: “Let us also go to die with Him.”
For San Beda, Doctor of the Church, what Thomas did “reveals his great perseverance, because he spoke as if he were capable of doing what he exhorted others, forgetting his fragility.” Finally, they go and Christ resurrects Lazarus.
2. Where is the path?
At the Last Supper, Jesus He began to instruct his disciples explaining to them that he would leave, but that he would return to take them with him. At one point, Thomas spoke up and said, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going. How are we going to know the way?”
Christ answered him: “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life. No one goes to the Father except through me. If you know me, you will also know my Father.” According to San Hilario de TrinJesus confirmed with the latter that “in the sacrament of the body that he has assumed is found the nature of the divinity of the Father.”
3. I want to touch your sores
The risen Christ appeared to his disciples, but without Thomas being present. When they told him what had happened, the Apostle said that he would not believe until he touched the wounds that the Lord had on his hands and side.
Christ agreed to his request, appears to him, orders him to touch the marks of his wounds and then rebukes him, telling him to be a man of faith.
Saint Gregory the Great explains that Christ tried two miracles that were contrary to each other: “Demonstrating after his resurrection that he was incorruptible and palpable, since what is touched is necessarily corruptible, and what is not corrupted is not palpable.”
“Incorruptible, then, and palpable, the Lord showed himself to prove to us that after his resurrection he preserved the same nature as us, and a different glory,” he specified.
4. “My Lord and my God!”
Thomas, contemplating the risen Christ, had no other words than to wisely say: “My Lord and my God.” According Theophylactancient ecclesiastical writer cited by Saint Thomas Aquinas in his book Catena Aurea (on commentaries on the gospels), the Apostle Thomas “becomes the best theologian.”
“Well, he spoke about the two natures of Christ in a single person because by saying ‘My Lord’, he confessed human nature and by saying ‘My God’ he confessed the divine and one God and Lord,” Theophylacto points out.
On the other hand, the “My Lord and my God” is a phrase that continues to be valid to this day in the Holy Mass. In several Latin American countries it is common for some people to pronounce it in a low voice during the consecration of the bread and wine. The liturgy does not require these words to be said, but it is a popular practice of faith.
Abel Camasca
Journalist graduated from the Communication Sciences degree at the University of Lima. He has been part of the ACI Prensa journalistic team since 2014. Between 2016 and 2022 he was in charge of the production of the television program EWTN Noticias and Más que Noticias, a World Catholic Radio program. He often writes articles about the lives of saints.