Touch

15 Mar 2017 • Articles

Touch

Author: Martyn Percy

St Thomas is often dubbed the Patron Saint of Doubt. Indeed, the phrase ‘doubting Thomas’ has entered into our lexicon of cherished national epithets. Who would want to be Thomas – the man who could not trust his own eyes? This is a pity, as the subtlety of John’s Gospel intends to convey Thomas’ faith, not his doubt: ‘blessed are those who have not seen, yet believe’ is not a word of chastisement to Thomas. It is, rather, a word to us all who will not see Jesus after he has ascended. We normally take this passage to refer to those Christians born after the ascension – all of us, who have to make do with our imaginations, stained-glass windows, icons, Franco Zefferelli and our favourite paintings – Caravaggio, Botticelli, Rembrandt or Da Vinci, to name but a few. But this is a rather lazy assumption on our part. For John is not talking about those who (literally) could not have seen Jesus; he has, I suspect, something else in mind.

What, then, does Thomas’ testimony now have to say to us? I suspect that John’s Gospel is trying to say something to us about seeing and touching, and about our role in holding people in the liminal, dark and uncertain places of life. In the Gospel of Mark, we read that Jesus ‘leads a blind man by the hand’. This is a gentle, tender image – as most of us would take a blind person by the arm, and walk side by side. But ‘leading by the hand’ has an edgy feel of risk about it. But Jesus does it anyway, for even in his hand we are safe to move forward. Even though we cannot see, his hand is enough for us – for all of us.

Closer inspection of the gospel narratives surrounding Thomas suggest that we should perhaps be less inclined to remember him as a person of doubt, and instead focus on the depth of his profound faith. Thomas is, according to John, one of several who have not yet seen the resurrected Jesus. Yet for Thomas, sight is not enough. Perhaps he already knows that our sight can be faulty and our eyes can sometimes deceive us. So what Thomas wants is a deeper encounter; something tactile that shows that there is a relationship between the tortured and crucified person he loves, and the person who now stands before him. In this sense, hands start to play a significant role in the encounter. Thomas must see the hands of Jesus for the mark of the nails. And he must touch the wound in Christ’s side with his own hands.

Touch, then, not sight, becomes the dominant theme of this encounter. And it reminds us that touch can carry so much more weight than words or sight. That what is seen and heard is sometimes not enough – for we ache for embrace: to be held, and to hold.Interestingly, so much of our ministry is about holding and touching. Even for clergy, and perhaps especially in the first few years of priesthood, one becomes aware of just how crucial touching and holding can be. Cradling a child at baptism; joining hands at a wedding; holding the dying and comforting the bereaved; the breaking of the bread; theanointing with oil: these are all ‘touching places’ where words are not enough. Here we need holy hands touching the wholly ordinary.

Bill Vanstone, the great Anglican spiritual writer, used to say that the Church of England is like a swimming pool: all the din and shouting comes from the shallow end. It is too easy to say that St Thomas is the patron saint of doubt; too superficial to dismiss him as someone who would not walk by faith, but by sight. But his testimony is richer and deeper, for in his persistence for the truth, he establishes the real connection between the physical Jesus and his torture, and the resurrected Christ. Touch is the key. Yes, the voices of the deep often go unheard; gestures in the twilight often go unnoticed; only connect. Touch.

For Thomas, as the disciples gather in the house, it is feeling and touching the suffering of Jesus – not just seeing it – that allows him to confess ‘My Lord and my God!’ And this is where Christian ministry begins – in having the courage to touch and be touched by the wounded yet risen Christ, so that we can embrace all those who may still be in the darkness, and for whom seeing and hearing will not be enough. We are called to behold and be held by Jesus, so we might hold others for him.

This is an extract from The Bright Field (Canterbury Press, £18.99).