Category Archives: healing

Thoughts on the Sunday readings: suffering as a "thin place" (5th Sunday in Ordinary Time – B)

08 Sunday Feb 2015

Posted by in Book of Job, Christ, Christian living, healing, sacrament, suffering, thin place

≈ Leave a comment

There is a story told about Mother Teresa of Calcutta.  A newspaper reporter assigned to write a story on her one day followed the elderly nun around the streets of Calcutta as she made her daily rounds.  At one point, Mother Teresa knelt down to cradle the head of a man who was obviously near death.  As she held his head, oblivious to the sores covering his body and the stench of the man’s illness, Mother Teresa assured him that he would not die alone.  She arranged for the man to be brought to the Home for the Dying that she has founded.  After witnessing all of this the reporter exclaimed to Mother Teresa, “Sister, I would not do what you are doing for a million dollars.”  Mother Teresa immediately replied, “Neither would I!”

Some cultures talk about “thin places”.  The thought is that “thin places” are those places in our world where visible and invisible reality comes into close proximity.  Part of the job of the believer is to recognize the thin place when it is encountered and to seek God’s presence in that place.  Thin places help us to recognize the truth of who we are (both good and bad), what truly motivates us and what calls forth from us true response.  
Certainly the Mass and the celebration of the sacraments are “thin places”.  Here heaven and earth are united and if we let ourselves learn to be open we can be deeply nourished and strengthened for the journey of discipleship.  
Another “thin place” revealed in two of our readings as well as this story about Mother Teresa is suffering in life.  Suffering – whether it be physical, emotional, spiritual – has a way of clearing away distractions and superficials in life.  In suffering we are brought to the truth of who we are and what truly motivates us.  
The story of Job is a reflection on the reality and mystery of suffering.  For any person who suffers, Job’s word’s ring true.  “…troubled nights have been allotted to me.  If in bed I say, ‘When shall I arise?’ then the night drags on; I am filled with restlessness until the dawn.  My days are swifter than the weaver’s shuttle; they come to an end without hope.”  The Book of Job invites us into the mystery of suffering not as a problem to be solved but a mystery to be lived and even a “thin place” where God is encountered and the truth of who we are can be found.  
In the gospel, we are told that Simon’s mother-in-law “lay sick with a fever”.  Christ is not unmoved.  We are told that Christ, “approached, grasped her hand, and helped her up.”  “Approached … grasped … helped” are not words to pass over lightly.  These words reveal the truth of who God is.  God is not unmoved or uncaring toward our pain and suffering.  Jesus, we are told, entered into the house of Simon and Andrew and he approached the woman who lay ill. 
God cares and God chooses to be involved in our lives and our world.  And we need this.  This is where the truth of who we are is also revealed.  We stand in need of a God who cares.  The wound within ourselves is too deep, too much for us to overcome on our own.  We need a God who will approach us, who will grasp our hands and who will help us up if we just ask.  We have this is Jesus. 
Mother Teresa was right – she wouldn’t do her great work of mercy and caring for a million dollars but she would do it for a God who cares and a God who loves.    

Jesus, the ten lepers and gratitude

13 Sunday Oct 2013

Posted by in Christ, conversion, gratitude, healing

≈ Leave a comment

Conversion begins with a cry out to God, it is continued through acts of faith and it is fulfilled through gratitude.   
In today’s gospel (Lk. 17:11-19) Jesus is continuing his journey toward Jerusalem and he is travelling through Samaria and Galilee.  As he begins to enter a village he is met by a group of lepers – a common reality of the day, lepers scratching out an existence on the margins of society, the edges of towns.  The lepers do not approach Jesus but they know their need, so they cry out Jesus, Master!  Have pity on us!  In one form or another, each one of us can and should make this prayer our own.  Conversion begins with the honest acknowledgement of our need before God and also the trust that our God does indeed care about us and our needs.  The lepers remain at a distance but Jesus does not.  He goes to the lepers.  God is big enough and great enough to come to us in our need, our pain and our isolation but God is also big enough and great enough to not want us to remain there.  
Go, show yourselves to the priests, says Jesus.  Jesus does not heal them there on the spot as he has done in other circumstances rather he asks that they make an act of faith in going to present themselves to the priests.  It is important to cry out to God but we also have to believe, we have to trust that God is caring and merciful and we have to show forth this belief.  If we want to know the truth of a person we should not just listen to what he or she says; we should more importantly watch what he or she does.  Our actions reveal what we believe.  A person of faith is authentically known by the way he or she lives.   
As they were going they were cleansed.  So often we look for lightning bolts, flaming bushes or the rending of the heavens when it comes to things of faith.  We forget that the life of faith is a journey … a daily journey.  It is as we go along in the journey; it is as we make those daily choices that we are healed and converted from that which has held us bound.  God does not need Hollywood special effects to accomplish his purposes.  God’s greatness is found in the subtle, simple ways in which his will is made known and accomplished. God’s will is active all around us; we just need to gain the eyes to see it. 
Maybe this is what happened to the other nine lepers (the ones who did not return)?  Expecting a lightning bolt moment and apparently not getting one they wrote Jesus off and easily attributed their healing to some other cause.  I think this happens quite often.  God’s glory is continually revealed in our midst and yet we fail to notice because it does not fit “our understanding” of how God should act.  Maybe we should let go of “our understanding” of how God needs to act and should learn how to focus on how God, himself, chooses to act.  I think that the latter is the better option. 
One leper does return.  He was a Samaritan.  He glorifies God and throws himself at the feet of Jesus in gratitude.  Where are the other nine, asks Jesus (maybe with a slight chuckle as he is fully aware of our tendency to not see when we choose not to)?  To the one who returned, he says, Stand up and go; your faith has saved you.  “Stand up…,” these two words are truly important.  In sin, we curve in on ourselves, we become hunched over spiritually and we can no longer stand erect in the full dignity in which we are made.  We might look the picture of perfect health on the outside, but (in sin) within we are hunched over and little.  By returning in gratitude this healed leper is not only healed without but also (and more importantly) within … your faith has saved you.  Gratitude fulfills conversion.  God loves us enough to not force his healing upon us.  Gratitude is our opening the door to Christ. 
Conversion begins with a cry out to God, it is continued through acts of faith and it is fulfilled through gratitude. 

Learning to See: Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time (B)

27 Saturday Oct 2012

Posted by in Bartimaeus, blindness, healing, homily, sight

≈ 1 Comment

Eustache Le Sueur “Christ Healing the Blind Man”

At one point in his Catholicism series, Fr. Robert Barron reflects on Israel’s hopes for the coming messiah.  He lists out the expectations of what the messiah would accomplish and he demonstrates how Jesus fulfills all of these expectations yet in often unexpected ways.  One such example is the expectation that the messiah would restore the unity of Israel.  Fr. Barron points out that Jesus does in fact accomplish this but not through leading an army nor through political maneuvering.  Jesus accomplishes the expectation of restoring unity through his miracles of healing.  In their physical impairments; the blind, the lame, the mute and the leper were not only handicapped in body but were also cut off from the ritual life of Israel and therefore could not fully participate in their society.  By his acts of healing not only was Jesus curing the physical ailment of the person but he was also restoring him or her to full participation in the community. 

This Sunday’s gospel story of the blind beggar Bartimaeus (Mk. 10:46-52) is a case in point.  But, not only that, it must be noted that Jesus recognizes the separation and isolation present that was easily overlooked by the very people who were longing for the messiah.  Mark tells us that when Jesus left Jericho he was with a sizable crowd and that as this crowd surrounding Jesus draws near and begins to pass the blind beggar Bartimaeus (in his poverty it must be noted) weakly begins to call out: Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me.  Mark specifically then states: And many rebuked him, telling him to be silent.  The very ones who were yearning for the full restoration of Israel remained blind to this man’s (their fellow Israelite) separation and isolation. 

But, Jesus saw Bartimaeus and he heard his cry.  In this we are brought to the realization that not just the work of restoring unity but also the ability to first see isolation and separation is an aspect that also marks the long awaited messiah as anticipated in the writings of the prophet Jeremiah.  Part of which we hear in today’s first reading (Jeremiah 31: 7-9): Behold, I will bring them back from the land of the north; I will gather them from the ends of the world, with the blind and the lame in their midst, the mothers and those with child; they shall return as an immense throng. 

Through Christ, we have been made a priestly people and we now share in the High Priesthood of Christ (Hebrews 5:1-6).  As a nation of priests we are entrusted with the work of restoring unity to a divided and hurting world and the first step in this work (upon which the whole is based) is the ability to see and recognize separation and isolation.  Separation and isolation within our own world and within our own hearts.  For this, it is essential that we have the trust and faith of the blind beggar.  Like Bartimaeus, we too need to trust that our God is a loving and merciful God who hears the cry of his people. 

Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me.  This must be our prayer and we must let this prayer lead us to the separated and isolated places of our world and the separated and isolated places in our own hearts because it is there that we will encounter Christ and we will truly come to know him as messiah.

After hearing his request, Jesus says to Bartimaeus: Go your way; your faith has saved you.  Mark then writes, Immediately he (Bartimaeus) received his sight and followed him (Jesus) on the way.  Through this encounter in a place of isolation and separation, Bartimaeus came not just to be healed physically of his blindness but also to be healed spiritually as he came to recognize Jesus as both Messiah and Lord.  Today’s gospel calls us also to a healing just as it did that first crowd.  May our blindnesses also be healed and may we learn to see as our Lord sees in order that our work of restoring unity might be true.