When the father of the rector of our Seminary died, all the priests and seminarians went to the funeral. The funeral was held in Bogota, about one hundred miles away. After the Mass, we all went to the cemetery as well. Bogota is a city of several million people, and, as expected, several more burials were being held at the same time. The bus on which I rode ended up in the wrong burial site. When we got there, we thought we were the first to arrive. There were no priests on the bus. There was, however, a deacon, who was in his last year of training.

When the casket was brought in, we did not see the rector or any other priest or seminarians. The mourners were having a burial without a minister and gave orders to proceed with the lowering of the casket. We were confused. Some of the seminarians were asking for the burial to be delayed until the deceased’s son and priests would arrive. The mourners were of course even more confused than we were, and, after a couple of minutes of puzzlement, they gave the final order to lower the casket.

Here is where the deacon I mentioned earlier entered the scene. Some seminarians had the brilliant idea of encouraging the deacon to lead the burial in prayer! After some initial hesitation, the deacon finally went to the front and started to intone a popular psalm that was traditionally used at burials. I then noticed some seminarians running in the direction of a larger crowd on the other side of the spacious cemetery where the “correct” burial was being held! That was our main topic of conversation then and in the following days. Some seminarians were mean to the deacon, and each time they saw him in the Seminary, they started to sing the famous burial psalm. I recall this story from my time in Seminary each time I hear this gospel account. The deacon believed without seeing.

“Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed”. People who have not seen the risen Lord, like us, are in this group of blessed people. We may ask, why does the Lord assure us that believing in him without the use of our sight is even better than using it? The explanation is given by the fact that we do not need anything else but his Words to believe in him. In fact, out of all the senses (sight, touch, taste, smell), it is our hearing the best sense for receiving the information about the mystery of God. All other senses get the information wrong. Our hearing, on the contrary, never gets it wrong. The Word of the Lord is true because He is the truth.

Saint Thomas Aquinas said it in verse: Not to sight, or taste, or touch be credit / Hearing only do we trust secure; / I believe, for God the Son has said it / -Word of truth that ever shall endure.

Hearing is how we believe. All the generations of Christians that have succeeded the Apostles’ have come to believe through hearing. We hear the story of the Lord and the testimony of those who witnessed the events. The Saints are the best examples we have of people who believed without seeing the risen Lord. They believed in his Word. There is no other way.

We do believe in the Lord. We, though, sometimes doubt as did Saint Thomas and ask for evidence. Let us humbly ask the risen Lord to grant us his grace to believe in him more fully, to put aside our doubts. Let us humbly ask him for his grace to dedicate more time in prayer to listen to his Words and trust and love him more.