Peace Be With You
John 20:19–31
The disciples are in a locked room. The doors are shut – not for privacy, but out of fear. They live in a time of political and ecclesial unrest. Their leader has died, their hopes have been shattered. Grief hangs heavy in the air, and no one knows what the future holds.
It’s a moment not so far from our own. In Canada, we’re on the precipice of a high-stakes federal election, with the political landscape deeply fractured. South of the border, our neighbours are coming apart at the seams. We watch nervously as temperatures rise in international relationships.
And in the midst of all this, we’ve lost a spiritual father. Pope Francis, who for over a decade embodied a Church that goes out to the peripheries, who challenged us to dream bigger and walk humbly, is now gone. For many of us, this grief that hangs heavy in the air is not just personal – it’s a collective disorientation. Like the disciples, we are trying to make sense of what has happened, and what might now unfold.
We live in a moment marked by division. Within our own communities, even our own churches, we’re witnessing the painful unraveling of a sense of unity we took for granted. The polarization is real. So are the fears. Will Pope Francis’ death mark the end of an era? Are we witnessing the beginning of a retreat from the reforming spirit he championed? Will the future of the Church be one of openness and accompaniment—or something else?
It’s into this climate – of fear, uncertainty, even despair – that the Risen Christ speaks.
“Peace be with you.”
This is no vague comfort. It’s not a platitude. It’s a commissioning.
Jesus enters a locked room – just as he enters our grief, our worry, our theological and political divides – and offers peace that is more than stillness. He gives a peace that sends us back out.
“Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
In this moment, when many feel unsure of where the Church is going, what our own vocations will mean in this shifting landscape, and whether there is still space for hope – we are reminded that vocation is not born of clarity, but of call. Jesus doesn’t wait for the disciples to be ready. He breathes on them, gifts them the Holy Spirit, and sends them – right in the middle of their fear, their confusion, and their fractured hearts.
And still, one of them isn’t there. Thomas is famously absent from that first encounter. And when he hears the news, he cannot bring himself to believe. Not unless he touches the wounds himself. Not unless he sees. We often cast Thomas as the doubter, but in truth, he might be the most honest of them all. He doesn’t hide his questions. He doesn’t fake belief for comfort. He needs to wrestle—and Jesus meets him in that place.
That, too, is a vocational moment.
In the wake of Pope Francis’ death, many of us find ourselves in a “Thomas moment.” Struggling to believe that the Church can still be a place of mercy and reform. Wanting to see some tangible sign that the doors will stay open, the margins will remain centered, the Gospel will still call us outward and not just inward.
But here’s the promise of this Gospel: Christ will return to the locked room. He will come back for Thomas. He always comes back for those who doubt, those who fear, those who aren’t quite ready. And when He does, He doesn’t scold. He doesn’t say, “You should have believed like the others.” He simply says: Touch. See. Believe.
This is the kind of Church, indeed the kind of world, that Pope Francis tried to shape – one that meets people where they are, one that doesn’t fear their wounds, one that gives space for encounter before demanding perfection. If we are to honor his legacy, we must remember that this vision wasn’t his alone. It was Christ’s from the beginning.
The future of the Church is uncertain – but that has always been true. The first disciples didn’t know what the Church would look like either. What they did know was this: the Risen Christ had breathed His Spirit into them and had sent them out.
That’s our calling, too. Now is the time to resist the urge to lock the doors again. Now is the time to be the kind of disciples who still believe Christ shows up in wounded places – in our divisions, our doubts, our grief.
Now is the time to go.
Not with all the answers. Not with naïve optimism. But with the quiet courage that comes from being sent by the One who passed through death, who spoke peace into fear, and who entrusted his mission to people just like us.
In these uncertain days, may we be strengthened by Jesus as he walks into the room and breathes peace into the fear:
“Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
Even now. Especially now.
By Darcie Lich
