Thomas Sunday is the first Sunday after Pascha, when we remember Christ appearing to the Apostle Thomas eight days after the Resurrection.
You know the story. Thomas wasn’t there when Jesus first appeared to the disciples on Pascha evening. When they told him they’d seen the Lord, he said he wouldn’t believe unless he could put his finger in the nail marks and his hand in Christ’s side. A week later, Jesus showed up again. This time Thomas was there. Christ invited him to touch the wounds, and Thomas fell to his knees: “My Lord and my God.”
That’s why we call it Thomas Sunday. The Gospel reading is John 20:19-31, the whole account of Thomas moving from absence to confession. But here’s what matters: we don’t celebrate “Doubting Thomas.” We celebrate believing Thomas. The Church honors his honesty and the faith that came from his encounter with the risen Christ.
This Sunday has other names too. Antipascha, which means “in place of Pascha.” New Sunday. Renewal Sunday. All these names point to the same thing: this day renews the joy of Pascha itself. Bright Week ends, but the Resurrection doesn’t stop being celebrated. Thomas Sunday kicks off the pattern we’ll follow the rest of the year, where every Sunday is a little Pascha.
The services still feel like Pascha. We sing the Paschal Troparion. The royal doors stay open. Everything’s still bright and celebratory. You’ll hear “Christ is risen” echoing through the church just like it did a week earlier. This isn’t leftovers from Easter. It’s a fresh start, the “eighth day” that the Church Fathers wrote about.
That eighth day language shows up a lot in Orthodox writing about this Sunday. Seven days make a week, the pattern of created time. The eighth day is beyond that, outside normal time. It’s the day of the Kingdom, the day that doesn’t end. When we celebrate Thomas Sunday as the eighth day after Pascha, we’re saying the Resurrection opens up eternity itself.
Thomas gets a bad rap in a lot of Protestant churches I grew up around. People remember him for doubting, like that’s his defining characteristic. But the Orthodox Church sees something different. Thomas asked for what he needed. Christ gave it to him. And then Thomas made the clearest confession of Christ’s divinity in all the Gospels: “My Lord and my God.” Not Peter. Not John. Thomas.
That matters for inquirers and catechumens. You’re allowed to ask questions. You’re allowed to say “I need to understand this better” or “I’m struggling with this teaching.” The Church doesn’t demand blind faith. She invites you to come and see, to touch and taste, to encounter Christ in the Mysteries and know for yourself. Thomas’s journey from absence to presence to confession is your journey too.
The icon for this feast doesn’t show a skeptic. It shows Thomas reaching toward Christ’s side while the other disciples watch. Sometimes it’s called “The Touching of Thomas” or “The Belief of Thomas.” Christ’s posture is gentle, inviting. He’s not scolding Thomas. He’s drawing him in. That’s what the Church does with all of us who come late to belief, who need more than words, who want to know if this is real.
After Thomas touches Christ, Jesus says something that reaches across two thousand years: “Because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” That’s us. We weren’t in that upper room. We don’t get to physically touch the wounds. But we receive Christ’s Body and Blood in the Eucharist. We encounter him in the prayers and the services and the life of the Church. We believe without seeing the way Thomas saw, and Christ calls that blessed.
If you’re in Beaumont and you’ve never been to an Orthodox service, Thomas Sunday is a good one to visit. The Paschal joy is still fresh, the singing’s still triumphant, and the whole celebration points to what the Church is really about: encountering the risen Christ and confessing him as Lord and God. You don’t have to have it all figured out first. Thomas didn’t either.
