The Lord is risen! He was dead, but God's love was stronger than man's hatred and violence.

He appeared to the women who wanted to anoint his dead body. Their love urged them to go to the tomb, completely irrational, some would say nonsensical. And yet, in this way, they found the One whom no one had sought and no one had expected: the Living One, the Risen One.

He sent them to the brothers. They are to tell them that he is alive, but they do not believe it. They run to the tomb, find nothing. Analyze the traces of this nothing exactly ("The sheet was not with the other sheets, but folded in a separate place"). But the scientific accuracy does not lead them beyond the tomb.

The disciples of Emmaus discuss the Scriptures with a stranger. The theological dispute leads nowhere; they recognize the Risen Lord only when he breaks bread with them.

That's how we humans are: we would like to have proof, sure, reliable! Thomas says: I will believe it only when I can touch it. Isn't that the prototype of modern man?

All Easter narratives show us in different ways that we cannot prove this mystery, neither with the natural sciences nor with the humanities. We cannot grasp the Risen Lord in the truest sense of the word.

But we don't need to. Women show us how it's done: It's all about the relationship. If we get involved, if we decide to trust his love and to answer it with our love, then we can experience the new life. He comes to us in the process - and nowhere does it say that Thomas actually put his finger on the wound. I strongly suspect that at the moment of the encounter with Jesus, he no longer needed to do that.