Lord's Day Reflection: Recognising the Risen Lord requires eyes of faith

By Fr Edmund Power, OSB

Today we proclaim the greater part of the final chapter of John. Many scholars believe that this chapter was added after the original completion of the Gospel. Be that as it may, it is part of the canonical text and shimmers with suggestiveness.

The appearances of Jesus after the Resurrection require a deep reading. It is curious, for example, that the disciples explicitly mentioned today as participants in the nocturnal and ineffective fishing trip were all impulsive figures, honest and with little sophistication, all referred to earlier in the Gospel: Peter, Thomas, Nathanael, and the sons of Zebedee.

Was the fishing trip an attempt to resume a “normal” life? To go back to what was familiar and comforting in the bewildering period following the death of Jesus? They caught nothing, however. There’s no going back: they are now being drawn into an unknown future. It is suggestive that just as dawn was breaking a mysterious stranger tells them where they might make a catch. The it was night (Jn 13:30) of Judas’s betrayal is coming to an end. We see here how, despite the lack of knowing who He was, their obedience is met with success: they were not able to haul (the net) in, for the quantity of fish. The ability to recognize the risen Lord requires the eyes of faith. Their faith is not yet strong enough. It is the prophetic voice of that disciple whom Jesus loved that calls them to awareness. Do we not all need the faith of others and a relationship of love with the Lord before we can know His presence among us, and bear witness to it? And even then, there remain the doubts and fears rooted in our human fragility: none of the disciples dared ask Him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord.

The shorter form of today’s Gospel concludes with this third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples. The longer version moves straight on into the dialogue with Peter. This is a powerful moment. St Augustine sees Peter’s threefold declaration of love as undoing his threefold betrayal. The two different Greek verbs for “love” used in the dialogue have led some scholars to believe that Peter is not yet able to give an unconditional answer, so Jesus reduces the intensity of the question. In any case, the Lord accepts Peter’s declaration, commissions him and then promises him a full immersion in the paschal mystery.  We too have been immersed in the waters of baptism; each of us will then follow his or her personal way of following the Lord. It doesn’t depend on perfection: it depends on love. It doesn’t depend on an unconditional love of which few of us are capable: if we humbly do our best the Lord will not reject us.