As we prepare to celebrate tomorrow the blessing that is our citizenship in “the Land of the Free,” our readings for today call us to reflect on a deeper blessing of citizenship that does not end at national boundaries. In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus extends a blessing to you: Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed. That’s you and me and all those who believe today that Jesus is their Lord. Today’s readings offer us a development of belief, from the lack of belief of Thomas the Apostle (who, as Didymus the twin, also reflects our occasional unbelief) to his amazement and subsequent belief in coming to recognize the truth of the resurrection, to the implications of such faith so beautifully described in the first reading, to the mission that is not so much grasped by believers in our Lord Jesus, but which grasps them as recipients of so great a gift that it cannot be kept to ourselves, but must be shared.

Believers, according to the Letter to the Ephesians in today’s 1^st reading, are already home among all those who believe. United with God and held together by a shared bond of love and belief, we create together already the future life we know awaits us. We create it by living joyfully the life that Christ holds out to us. By living now already as citizens of the Reign of God to which faith in Jesus admits us, we are no longer “strangers and sojourners,” but we are at home, already living the fullness of life promised by Christ. Blessed we are indeed, to be living stones creating a space in this world where God already dwells in the Spirit.

This very way of life, founded on belief in the Lord Jesus, is already a preaching that is irresistible to those with eyes to see and ears to hear. Who does not want a life characterized by reconciliation and love, a life where everyone is valued for who they are rather than what they contribute or can offer to others? We evangelize through our belief and the nature of the lives that flow from that belief. We are evangelizers by living our belief. At the same time, we must always be prepared to give reason for our hope that this full life is not bounded by death, that it is the life that believers will enjoy for all eternity. Who can resist that good news!?