Blessed are they who do not see and yet believe, Jesus said to Thomas. Was this a kind of echo of God's word to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Paradise? For the ancients, as well as for the moderns, like Thomas, we "know" what we can verify through our senses: she saw that the apple was good for food and pleasing to the eye. That she knew. What she did not "know" was the poison of not trusting God. This knowledge is what every one of us must learn for ourselves. We know what we've been told, but we don't believe it until we taste for ourselves.
St. Ausgustine taught that the "inner Christ" is the divine truth and light within us, closer than we are to ourselves. In his Confessions, he argues that God is present within us, as the source of wisdom and truth. Our inner teacher is Christ who shines on the mind to reveal truth. Now, Thomas had, during the three years he spent with Jesus, undoubtedly come to experience Jesus as the Way, the Life, and the Truth. His failing was that he could not trust what he knew internally. What he "knew" was what he had seen --- Jesus taken from the cross and laid in the tomb, and the door sealed.
St. Augustine's beautiful prayer "O Beauty ever ancient/ O Beauty ever new/ You, the beauty of my life renewed,/ let me find my life in You" can be found in his Confessions. But today, it is easier to access it online --- and even better to listen to it sung by the St. Louis Jesuits, which will pop up when you google O Beauty Ever New.
It is easy for us to trust what we "know" through our senses and our reasoning. But that knowledge ultimately leads to death until our "Inner Jesus" begins to teach us the Way, the Truth, and the Life. Most of us are afraid to simply ask Him to show us the Truth; we, like Thomas, are afraid to trust that He is real. But "Show me!" is a prayer that He will answer.
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