Divine Mercy with Sts. Aquinas & Clairvaux
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April 13, 2026Happy Easter to all of you! This weekend I will be away leading a parish retreat in North Carolina on the theme of God’s mercy. That is especially fitting, because this weekend is Divine Mercy Sunday. In those retreat talks I will be drawing from St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Bernard of Clairvaux. Aquinas teaches us that God’s mercy is not simply God feeling sorry for us. It is God acting to heal what we cannot heal ourselves. If Aquinas gives us a theology and ethics of mercy, Bernard gives us a spiritual psychology of mercy. He helps us see why so often we fail at mercy and how God can reform our hearts.
This weekend in the Gospel, the risen Jesus comes to the disciples while they are hiding behind locked doors. He speaks peace into their fear. He shows them His wounds. He breathes the Holy Spirit upon them. He sends them on mission and gives them authority for the forgiveness of sins. A week later, He returns for Thomas, who doubted, and leads him to faith and to the great confession: “My Lord and my God.” In the second reading, St. Peter tells us that by God’s great mercy we have been given a new birth into a living hope through the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. The first reading gives us a glimpse of what that new life looks like in practice: the first Christian community was devoted to the apostles’ teaching, to fellowship, to the breaking of the bread, and to prayer.
The Gospel has an important lesson for us as a Catholic community. Christ is the leader. He is at the center. But notice how He gathers His disciples. He does not lead by pressure, fear, or force. He stands in their midst and says, “Peace be with you.” The heart of the Christian community is not anxiety but peace. And in this community, to share in Christ’s peace is also to share in His mission. Jesus says, “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” He is not a one-man show. He does not hoard the mission. He entrusts it to His disciples. Yet the authority He gives them is never their own possession. It is derived from Him, accountable to Him, and ordered to His work of reconciliation and salvation.
It is also striking that Thomas was absent the first time Jesus appeared. He struggled. He doubted. He was unconvinced. Yet the community did not cast him off, and the Lord returned for him. That too is a lesson for us. Healthy Catholic communities know how to hold people together long enough for grace to work.
That is why Divine Mercy Sunday matters so much for parish life, not only as a devotion, but as a practical way of living together. Bernard insists that correction without humility becomes condemnation. Aquinas would add that correction without charity is not virtue at all; it is vice dressed up in religious language. God’s mercy should hold up a mirror to our own hearts. When truth is spoken without love, it wounds instead of heals. When standards are upheld without mercy, people stop hearing the Gospel and hear only accusation. But when mercy and truth remain together, the Church becomes what she is meant to be: a place where sinners can repent, where the wounded can come home, and where people can discover that holiness is really possible.
Mercy is not laxity. Mercy is not simply being “nice.” Jesus does not tell the disciples that sin does not matter. On the contrary, He gives them authority precisely in relation to sin and forgiveness. Mercy takes sin so seriously that it refuses to leave the sinner trapped in it. Aquinas reminds us that God’s mercy does not cancel justice; it fulfills justice by healing what is broken. Bernard reminds us that only the humble heart can participate in that healing without turning correction into humiliation. So in parish life, mercy means taking responsibility for the spiritual climate we create. Is our parish a place where people feel safe enough to tell the truth? Do those who have failed believe repentance is possible here? Do those carrying shame believe they can return?
Acts gives us an example to imitate: a Church gathered in teaching, worship, prayer, and charity. The Gospel shows us the source of that life: the risen Christ, His wounds, His peace, His Spirit, and His mercy. That is our calling too across all six churches of St. Michael Parish. Though each church community has its own character and history, we are meant to be united as one people formed by the mercy of the risen Lord.
So here is the challenge for this week: before you correct someone, judge someone, or speak about someone’s faults, stop and ask: Am I making this about myself? Am I trying to be right, or am I truly trying to help? This week, strive to act with mercy. Let the mercy you have received from the risen Christ become mercy you give. That is how Easter can change a parish. That is how the locked doors begin to open.