by Jenna Legg
Sr. Mary Garascia recently wrote a reflection for Sunday's Gospel that inspired me. (You can find her short post here.) Sr. Mary talks about how Jesus' wounds are still present in his glorified body. As someone who studied theology and scripture, I knew this to be the case, but after being immersed in Precious Blood Spirituality, new thoughts emerged.
To some extent, I'm sure we all want to erase our wounds and act as if the bad events of our lives never happened. It was certainly an option for Jesus, who conquered death, to appear in a glorified body without the wounds of the cross. But God gives us a picture of true reconciliation and true justice by glorifying even his wounds.
It's the cross that makes Jesus' resurrection so powerful, so why would we want to forget what Jesus' triumphed over? Many times, it's the trials in our lives that have shaped us into who we are. Of course we do not want to relive them or even wish them upon others; but we can be grateful for the lessons we learned and the spiritual growth that was made.
Reconciliation isn't about simply returning to the way things were before the sin, loss or event. No, it's about learning to live in a peaceful way with the consequences of what happened. We cannot achieve this reconciliation by simply forgetting what happened. We must remember and move forward.
I think this is what it means to be a Sister of the Precious Blood. We embrace the fullness of the paschal mystery; we remember the scars but celebrate the resurrection. We accept the sorrows, the trials and the grief, but do the work to move forward in joy toward peace. So, today's Gospel is a wonderful glimpse into Precious Blood Spirituality -- a resurrected Jesus with wounded hands.
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