Doors, Unlocked (2011-05-01, 2nd Sun. Easter)

This is my homily for 1 May 2011, 2nd Sunday of Easter/Divine Mercy Sunday. I am a Catholic chaplain at Fairleigh Dickinson University (FDU) campus and for the FDU Newman Catholic Association. We celebrate Catholic Mass - during Fall and Spring semester - every Sunday Mass (7:30 p.m.) at the Interfaith Chapel, 842 River Road, Teaneck, NJ.

Acts 2:42-47 | Psalm 118 | 1 Peter 1:3-9 | + John 20:19-31

[__01- __] Isn’t it a very effective way to get someone’s attention, to place a note under the door, in the door, or on the door?
Voice mails, e-mails, texts … come sun-limited plans and unlimited numbers do they come, but a note under the door is different. I have to bend my knees, stretch my arms to reach it. It will be more memorable, noticeable.

[__02____] Reaching through the doors of the locked upper room, Jesus grabs the attention of his disciples. This is a note they will save, and share, and forward. The message which makes it through the door is Christ himself.

Why the locked door? For shelter, refuge from the authorities who might arrest these disciples by association with Jesus of Nazareth whom they crucified. They believe in the locked door, the door as firewall protection against anything unnecessary, extraneous, or dangerous.

[__03- __] Therefore, Thomas the Apostle at first believes that nothing – no one – could make it past this filter. Thomas asks for the message to be re-sent, delivered personally to his in-box.

Does Thomas doubt – do we sometimes doubt … that God cannot find us? Or God is not seeking is …or do we doubt, thinking God has not already been here before…?

[__04____] Tempted we might be to file Thomas away and his own messages as showing … belligerence, defensiveness, reluctance.

Yet, isn’t Thomas also, simply, astonished and inquisitive? His so-called “doubts” indicate a desire to know the Lord, to encounter Christ personally. Thomas is surprised at what has happened – not indifferent – he is not completely devoid of faith in the resurrection.

He leaves the door open [a little…]

[** pause **]

[__05- __] Who is Thomas-behind-the-locked door for you, for me?

Do we find someone else hard to reach behind a door? Am I the person who is behind the door ?

[__05(a)- __] First, the other person who is locked in…

Sometimes, we arrive to deliver a message and find the door locked, after regular business hours, a holiday. We could leave a note.

In this regard, we can reasonably expect that not everyone is 100% available at all times.

On the other hand, sometimes, we might encounter someone who is inaccessible most of the time, all the time, locked up for some reason.

And, in this case, we may wish we had an ADMINISTRATOR password or a MASTER key to get through to the person.

These keys are not easy to come by. Sometimes, I may encounter someone whose door is closed because of something I have said, something I have done…

Or, I encounter someone whose door is closed because of some other circumstance, tragedy, crisis, sorrow.

I knock, call, no one answers. This may even happen in a relatively close relationship, family too.

In such a case, we are trying to reach beyond a locked door. We may not be able to get through ourselves. We may not even be able to get a note under the door.

In such a case, we need Christ himself to pass through.
A door which we pray Jesus would pass through, unlock from the inside, then turn the knob and let us in.

Isn’t this an example of praying for our enemies, praying for those who persecute us … from behind a barrier or locked door?

Isn’t this also what we pray for when we are estranged, alienated, distant, separated from someone we love?

Praying, meditating, we beg that the Lord will help our messages get under or through the door.

[__05(b)- __] Secondly , I may be the one locked in… Or any one of us could be the one locked in.

The door can also be something that I can hang, install … but then lock. I construct this with my pride, my complacency, my fear.

Am I a locked door?

In this, you and I are called to examine our lives, this Second Sunday of Easter and Divine Mercy Sunday, remembering that Christ comes into our lives with his mercy and love.

In the sacrament of penance and reconciliation we experience this.. . also just on the other side of a door.

When we confess our sins,we approach Christ, we might imagine that we have call upon him, invite him into the room ….or that we better hope he’s in the room.

In fact, we need only recognize – as Thomas is called to recognize– that Christ has already been here. Jesus was here a week ago, Peter, James and John would tell Thomas.

Jesus was also here [in this chapel, church…] last Sunday, the Sunday before that and every other Sunday…

Just as the purpose of a door is to be opened …or at least have some space through which air, light, messages can pass through, it is the nature of Christ to let us in, to forgive us.

Christ himself calls himself the door, the door to the sheepfold, the gate for the sheep..and our doorway to God’s presence through Holy Communion.

Can I see …can you see Christ in this doorway, the doorway here at St. Peter’s and beyond….the doorway … of our home?

Today, in the Beatification of Pope John Paul II, we see Christ in the doorway of his life, how our late Holy Father tried to make Christ present in difficulty, sorrow. For John Paul, his physical body became a locked door through Parkinson’s. But, we also saw that he allowed Christ into his doorway… in his courage and bravery.
Desiring to persevere late in life, he was allowing Christ into the room.

Can see Christ in all of our doorways? of our room, of our office, of our classroom… the doorway to the car we also serve him in our travels… that Christ is present in these doorways, waiting inside to receive us …and leaving notes he does not want us to miss.

[__end__]