Luke 17: 11-19
The Word: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/101225.cfm
In this age of medical miracles, antibiotics, pain relievers, cancer treatment, open heart surgeries, organ donors, vitamins, cures and potential cures and vaccinations for many diseases that threaten us, it may be very difficult to imagine a society with none of those medical advancements and protections. We would be helpless victims of just about anything that would endanger our health. With no knowledge of bacteria, infection, and how the human body works, we might well become fatalistic. If you’re terminally ill, that’s it. Your time is up. Those afflicted with physical or mental disabilities, would be labelled as punished for some wrong they must have done. For a moment, imagine such a society.
If we could, we would walk in the world of Jesus’ time. The familiar story in our Gospel this Sunday reveals both cultural prejudice and the outward boundaries which Jesus’ challenged the society of his time. These poor individuals afflicted with some sort of skin affliction generally termed leprosy, literally were shunned from both society and from worship so they essentially belonged nowhere. And Jesus walks in that same boundary between Samaria and Galilee knowing exactly why he is there.
The story names leprosy as the disease these unfortunate souls, these “ten lepers” suffered with. Would you like to be identified by the condition you suffer rather than by your name or your humanity? No longer would you be John or Mary being treated for cancer. Now you would be “those cancerous ones” or “those cancerites” or some such dehumanizing identity. Such a label might cause more pain than the disease itself. Such was true in the time of our Lord.
Our readings this Sunday open with a similar story about Naaman, a man of great influence, who on the word of Elisha the prophet plunged himself in the waters of the Jordan river and was cured of his leprosy. In fact, his flesh, “became again like the flesh of a little child.” While the healing is significant, Naaman’s reaction is even more so. He was filled with overwhelming gratitude and wanted to offer a gift to Elisha who refused to take the gift because he rightly saw that such healing came about through God’s work alone. It is the God of Israel who would heal Naaman and there is where the gratitude should be directed.
Likewise, it seems that those afflicted all had a sense that Jesus could cure them; they believed in him on that level. They went to show themselves to the priest according to custom once cured and along their way to the Temple, they were cured. Yet only one returned to give thanks, the Samaritan, the foreigner who would not be allowed in the Temple precinct, came back to give thanks to Jesus. His faith in Christ was more than just a surface level of request.
There was also the question of which temple to return to? Being a Samaritan, they would not be allowed near the Jerusalem temple but would go to Samaria where the Gerezine temple was located. The temple built by the Samaritan peoples and claimed by them to be the only true one. So, which temple should he go to?
He recognized what Jesus had done for him, the new life a kind of resurrection experience that he now had and was so moved to gratitude for what Jesus did for him. How he was saved from a dead-end life no longer in the stigma of sin but in the new life of God’s mercy.
Yet, even more, Jesus is now seen as the new Temple where all are welcome and invited to for healing and wholeness. Whether the one in Jerusalem or the one in Samaria, does not matter. He returns to the true Temple of God, Jesus himself, to offer thanks. It is our coming to Christ, our faith in him, that will cure the leprosy of sin we all find in ourselves.
At the word alone of Jesus, those afflicted set out with complete trust. We see it in the healing stories when he says: “be healed, rise and walk, receive your sight, Lazarus come forth, this is my Body, this is my Blood, and your sins are forgiven.” Such words ring deep in our hearts knowing, as the Samaritan man in our Gospel came to realize, that faith in Christ Jesus is where our lives need to be centred. Simply his word alone is all that is needed.
Powerfully, we are also reminded that this healing ministry of Jesus was not alone something of his time. But that work continues in the sacramental ministry of the Church. Through the sacraments of Reconciliation, Anointing of the Sick and the Holy Eucharist we encounter the living Christ who comes to us as the divine physician as it were, to gather us together in a community of trust, thanksgiving and healed people
So here we might ask, what is my leprosy? What afflicts me that moves me to turn to God for help? What wound or sin do I carry that continues to be a burden in my life? It might be physical, emotional, or spiritual emptiness. Whatever forms our leprosy may take, and we all are afflicted, we must bring that before Christ for healing and help.
So, where that leaves us is to recognize how in the
Church Jesus continues this same ministry of grace and mercy. We hear: “I absolve you from your sins,"
"I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,"
"Be sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit," "Through this holy
anointing may the Lord free you from sin", "This is my Body, this is
my Blood.”
These are the powerful words of Jesus spoken in the sacraments and in particular in that great, central sacrament of thanksgiving, the Holy Eucharist. Christ comes to us in a substantial presence and invites us to lay our concerns on the altar for offering.
When is the last time you felt truly grateful for the Mass? The Venerable Bishop Fulton Sheen once said that if we had true faith, we would be crawling up to Communion! Such an image emphasizes the profound, undeserved gift of our Lord given in the Eucharist that we should be so overwhelmed by what Christ has done for us that we would symbolically approach him with heads bowed, hands held out and return to our pew with one giant “Thank you” on our lips. As priest I must constantly remind myself of my own unworthiness to stand at the altar and bring Christ to all.
Yes, gratitude for gift given, for his grace, and for who Christ is for us is seems to having a new birth in many people these days. The events of the past few months, terrible shootings and violence as a solution to disagreements, has no place in a civilized society. People are beginning to turn to Christ again but in so many areas, it is still lacking these days. Let us turn that around and truly be grateful and humble servants of the Lord from whom all good things come. That is a faith that will save us.
May your grace, O lord,
at all times go before us and follow after
and make us always determined
to carry out good works.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit
God, for ever and ever.
(Sunday Collect)
No comments:
Post a Comment