SIXTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME, CYCLE B
- First Reading (Leviticus 13:1-2, 44-46), we are presented with the terrible existence of leprosy sufferers in Old Testament Judaism. The priest declared the leper unclean, who had to live in isolation outside the camp.
- The Responsorial Psalm (Psalm 31) shows us a merciful God who erases our faults. Just as the leper confesses his illness, we too must acknowledge our faults and turn to the Lord for forgiveness.
- Second Reading (1 Corinthians 10:31-11:1), Paul exhorts us to follow Christ’s example. By following his Christian standards, we can reflect God’s compassion and mercy in our daily lives.
- Gospel according to St. Mark (1:40-45). In this passage, Jesus encounters a leper who comes to him in humility and supplication, «Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.» Jesus’ response is moving: «I will, be cleansed» and integrates him back into the life of his people.
A new day begins and we wake up at dawn to listen and contemplate, both attitudes are fundamental to approach God and his will. Listening implies being attentive, receptive and willing to obey. Contemplating implies admiring, thanking and praising. Both attitudes help us to enter into communion with God and with others.
Listening.
The Gospel recounts the last passage of chapter 1 of the Gospel according to Mark in verses 40-45 entitled «The Healing of a Leper». I invite you to break down the text which will allow us to become part of the scene, to imagine, to listen and to involve the rest of the senses. We find Jesus on the outskirts of a village (Mk 1:40), he meets a leper who asks to be healed if it is his will (Mk 1:40b), Jesus expresses his desire to see him healed (Mk 1:41), he sends him to fulfill the prescriptions of Moses so that his health may be established (Mk 1:44) and people come to him from everywhere (Mk 1:45).
Contemplate.
In the reflection of this passage the context is important. According to Jewish law, the priest was the one who could declare a person impure, who from that moment on was excluded from the social and religious life of his people, having to go to live on the outskirts of the town among other sick and possessed people. In this context we place a leprous man who approaches Jesus carrying in himself the marginalization, the exclusion, the repudiation, the unworthiness, the worry of being even rejected by God and with the weakness of the one who has banished from himself every reason to live, he puts himself in Jesus’ hands without demands «If you want, you can cleanse me».
Jesus had compassion (Mk 1:41a), he approaches him, he does not remain indifferent, he allows himself to be involved and wounded by the pain, by the sickness of the one he meets on the road; he touches him with his hand (Mk 1:41b), he does not turn back, his goal is the man, to heal his wounds; and says to him (Mk 1:41c) «I will, be cleansed», words that reintegrated him not only to the social but also to the religious life of his community, so Jesus sends him (Mk 1:44b) as established by the Law, go and present yourself before the priest so that it may be recorded before all that you are now cleansed of your sickness.
The passage continues Mk1, 45b and says that Jesus stayed in the outskirts because he could no longer enter freely into the villages, a significant fact that brings us closer to the essence of God for whom borders do not exist, Jesus remains in this theological place thus fracturing the differences of the old law that separated the cursed from the blessed. There he received the sick from many places, so this place must become for everyone a call to personal and pastoral conversion, and for this let us not be afraid to go to the peripheries of the other worlds and our own, where we are all one with the Father, the Son and the Spirit. There where we are all Church in going out, Church on the way.
Invitation.
The Lord is waiting for you in the peripheries where you learn to look at life in many colors, where life hurts, where there are only equals and where you can feel your vulnerability, discover your own despair, bare your heart, not be an appearance, be reconciled with yourself, with others, build bridges, give and receive mercy.
To approach the personal and pastoral conversion implicit in this biblical passage, it is important to give answers to these questions:
- Who are the lepers of today?
- Do you have any leprosy that prevents you from living in fraternity, reconciled and hopeful? Today you can ask Jesus to be cleansed.
- What are the peripheries where you can meet the Lord?
Intention.
In the contemplated context we ask the Lord to see him in order to know him internally, to love him, to accept his will and to refresh the memory of our own salvation history.
S. Mariulis Grehan, tc