We
began Mass this morning with an announcement about precautions connected with
this year’s flu epidemic. Flu comes and goes – its seriousness varying in
mysterious ways from year to year. This year marks the centennial of the infamous 1918
“Spanish Flu” –the most devastating world-wide flu pandemic of the modern era,
which claimed up to 20% of its victims’ lives.
Some
people are just healthier than others; but few of us escape any sickness at
all. Some are much more seriously sick, perhaps even chronically ill, the
likelihood of which increases as we age. And we all worry about some new
disease – or the return of an old one like the flu - unexpectedly upsetting
business as usual. My “Baby-Boom” generation can clearly remember the last great polio epidemic in the early 1950s – the
last such epidemic in the US, thanks to the development of the polio vaccine,
which as 1st graders many of us were among the first to receive.
That particular epidemic induced tremendous panic. People were terrified of a
dangerous disease, which many feared might never be conquered. Since then, thanks
to effective efforts to vaccinate people everywhere against polio, that disease
is now close to being eradicated in the world.
All
that should help us appreciate the anxiety ancient people felt when faced with
the mysterious disease they called leprosy. Hence, the Old Testament’s extensive
instructions on how to deal with it, some of which we just heard in today’s 1st reading. Until 1969, the United Sates had a similar system of legally enforced
segregation of lepers in Hawaii – made famous for generations of Catholic
school children by the heroic story of Saint Damien of Molokai, whose statue
stands in the U.S. Capitol Building’s Statuary Hall, and the more recently
canonized Saint Marianne Cope, who likewise served the leper colony in Hawaii.
In
ancient Israel, what was called leprosy was often a superficial skin condition,
which was curable. Hence the law provided for examination by a priest and an
offering on the occasion of someone’s being cured. Until one had been properly
examined and certified as healed, however, a “leper” remained ritually impure.
In
such a world, where it was believed that only God could heal leprosy and where
sickness was seen as a serious threat, the leper was shunned. Cut off from
ordinary life and regular relationships with others, the leper’s lot was a sad
one indeed. Then suddenly, into all this sadness, appeared Jesus.
Apparently,
the news about Jesus and his healing powers had made the rounds. So suddenly a leper came to Jesus and kneeling down
begged him and said, “If you wish, you can make me clean.”
“If you wish!” What exactly are we
to suppose that “if” meant? Did the leper doubt Jesus? And, if so, what exactly
was he doubting about Jesus? Apparently, he didn’t doubt that Jesus had the
power to heal him – quite amazing actually, given the general belief that only
God could cure leprosy! If the leper had little or no doubt about Jesus’ power
and ability, to heal him, however, he
still seems evidently to have wondered whether Jesus would heal him, in other
words, whether he would want to heal him, whether he cared enough to heal him.
Jesus
understood and answered: “I do
will it. Be made clean.” But, before he said that, Jesus did
something even more meaningful, something so radical it in fact that it
implicated Jesus in the leper’s ritually impure status. Moved with pity, Jesus stretched
out his hand, and touched him.
In
his desperation, the leper had boldly broken the Law and approached Jesus
directly. Jesus reciprocated with a dramatic, unexpected touch that spoke more
than all the words in the world. With that one touch, Jesus identified himself
with the leper, dramatically ending his segregation from society. With that one
powerful touch, Jesus summarized his entire mission to become one with us, and
so to end our segregation from God and enable us to join together in the
fuller, more abundant kind of life that God wants us to live.
The
same Jesus, who stretched out his hand,
and touched the leper, continues his healing touch here and now in the
institutional and sacramental life of his body, the Church. That touch is every bit as necessary now as
it was then – not just because sickness and suffering still surround us, but
because the leper’s doubt also persists. How many of us at times really wonder
whether anyone cares? How many of us at times doubt deep down whether
even God cares?
It
is the mission and challenge of the Church – the mission and challenge
therefore of each and every one of us – to express visibly and to embody
physically God’s healing presence and saving power present in our world, to
continue Christ’s caring for us, by caring as he does.
As
the Law required, Jesus sent the leper to
the priest to verify his healing, and to make the ritual offering in
thanksgiving that the Law prescribed. Presumably, the leper went and did what
was required for him to re-enter society, but the leper’s most powerful act of
thanksgiving was to spread the report
abroad and publicize the whole
matter.
Whatever
difficulties and doubts we may harbor, our healing will not be complete until
we let Christ’s healing touch transform us - in and through our life and
worship together as his Church - into agents of Christ’s caring touch to and
for all the world.
No comments:
Post a Comment