Dear friends in Christ, a glance at our first reading today sets before us the interesting and loving way the early Christians witnessed to the Resurrection of Christ. They were a selfless community characterised by communal ownership of everything. Summarily, we could say everything owned by anyone belonged to nobody but everybody. This was truly a community united in heart and soul as communicated in the opening verse (cf. Acts 4:33) of today’s passage. When we try to juxtapose this early community with our present day community there is a lot left to be desired. It is difficult to say that we are a community united in heart and soul for a number of persons and communities in the world think most times not of the other but of the self and the self alone. After over a year that the world has been ravaged by the COVID-19 pandemic we still cannot say we have learnt to be more selfless and united in heart and soul. Even with the advent of the many vaccines, we see communities that think only of themselves and not of the other. Little wonder, the Holy Father, Pope Francis, admonished nations to ensure that walls of nationalism are not built in the pandemic that knows no borders.
He reiterated admonition during his Easter message as he called for the sharing of vaccines most especially among the poor and vulnerable persons. This is certainly the kind of example that the early Christian community sets for us as seen in today’s first reading. Beloved sisters and brothers, the Easter season is certainly a time when we rejoice in being made a new creation and new beings. It is a time that we are born anew having put to death our old ways that are not in tandem with the ways of the risen Christ. If we celebrate the season of regeneration and new beginnings, claiming to be born of God and yet we cannot act as God will, it will then be paramount for us to revisit our parentage. What kind of Easter people would we be if we cannot overcome the world as is expected of us at Easter (cf. 1 John 4:4)? Our second reading makes it categorically clear to us that we can only say we are born of God or anew when we unitedly in heart and soul exhibit a spirit of communitarianism and selflessness in our various communities.
If someone unknown to you walks up to you and queries the genuineness of you claim to be born anew or of being born of God, it would suggest that there are certain actions or works of yours that do not represent the parentage you claim or your status as a new being or a new creation. There is a captivating way Islam addresses God that buttress our knowledge of God. Basically, Muslims begin every good deed, and individual daily actions, that are not religiously forbidden, such as eating, or entering one’s workplace by uttering, “Bi’smi-llāhi’r-Rahmāni’r-Rahīm” translated as “in the Name of God, the All-Merciful, the All-Compassionate.” This is who they know Allah or God to be and it is the same for us Christians. Today, being the Feast of Divine Mercy serves as a reminder to us of our God who is All-merciful and compassionate. Without the mercy of God we will be nowhere. Basically, it is because of the mercy of God that we can lay claim to being new beings and being born of God. God’s mercy is everlasting and endures forever as we are reminded in psalm 118 given as our psalm for today.
If today then we celebrate the Feast of Divine Mercy it is to erase any atom of doubt we may have in our hearts about the merciful nature of God. His mercy flows continuously and is available for everyone who taps into it. In truth then, “salvation has absolutely nothing to do with human merit but absolutely everything to do with divine mercy” says David Platt. Beloved people, Divine Mercy is something we are given. Every single day we enjoy the limitless mercy of God that he continues to pour out. Similarly, in today’s gospel passage, the risen Christ comes among the disciples and the first thing he offers them was ‘Peace’ (v. 19) to calm their troubled minds. While standing among them he further gives them the Holy Spirit and charges them to be dispensers of forgiveness (vv. 22-23) In as much as they were given the power to retain sins the onus of their mandate was that they ensure that the communities of the world are saturated with the mercy of God.
We are thus reminded this day, dear friends, that we who are beneficiaries of the mercy of God which has made us a new creation must make sure that we never retain mercy from another. We need be reminded that each time we approach the confessional in faith and we put our fingers that have been soiled by sin and unbelief in the marks of the nails in his body, we come away cleansed having been washed in the river of God’s mercy. It is necessary for us that as God broke through barriers and shut doors of unbelief to bring us his limitless mercy, we must in same vein ensure that nothing holds us back from reaching out to many communities and peoples who are in most need of mercy so that they also may enjoy the peace and forgiveness that God wants for the world. It becomes pertinent for us to ensure that nothing limits us from shouing human mercy to the needy ones in our communities, sharing with them the resources we have. When we do this, according Alistair Begg we see that, “Human mercy is a proof of having received divine mercy.” For instance, research shows that to end world hunger by the year 2030, $330 billion will be required.
Yet as at today the valued net worth of the two richest men in the world Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk by Forbes, valued at $188.5 billion and $169.9 billion respectively is enough to solve this world problem in one day. Interestingly, with all the riches and rich men and women in the world, many go to bed hungry and die of hunger daily simply because many of us are not truly born of God in order for us to be dispensers of mercy. We are lacking in human mercy even when Divine mercy is not lacking. We have a country, Nigeria which is prickly blessed by God but for the greed of a limited few that which belongs to everyone is owned by someone or some persons and not everybody.
A people that were once communitarian are fast daily becoming more and more individualistic by their greed and selfishness while depriving many of mercy. If any of us claims to be a Christian in this country or elsewhere, one who has risen with Christ at Easter, one who calls God, Father, and she or he retains forgiveness to another, shuts his or her door to the one in need for fear of nothing having enough for tomorrow, fails to bring peace to troubled hearts around him or her, possess an individualistic rather than communal spirit, such a one needs to rethink his or her birth in Christ, for if we have as Father the All-merciful and compassionate God, we, His children cannot be All-merciless, less- merciful or un-compassionate. Our community, our Country is in need of united hearts and souls in mercy to bring about peace and the healing of our world.
