
Last Sunday, the reading
from Mark’s gospel brought us stories of Jesus healing one sick person
after another, beginning at the local synagogue where he healed a
possessed person, and continuing with Simon Peter’s mother-in law who
was in bed with a fever. Before long, if you remember, he had the whole
town at his door, clamoring for his healing touch.
Today we have yet
another healing, the healing of a leper, but this healing takes us into
tricky territory because it involves more than healing: it also involves
breaking the Law. The leper broke the Law, but so did Jesus. Let me
explain.
The Law, when it came to
lepers, was clear. We heard it in today’s reading from the Book of
Leviticus. The Law said that lepers were to dwell apart, to remain as
far as possible away from people and, if people should chance to come
near, the leper was to make his or her whereabouts known by shouting
“unclean, unclean!” There was good reason for this. Leprosy was thought
to be highly contagious; people lived in dread of any sort of contact
with lepers. So, the leper in today’s gospel story clearly broke the
Law. By coming out of the shadows, walking right up to Jesus, kneeling
down before him, and even daring to engage him in conversation, he broke
the Law. And you can imagine how people must have reacted. Their
reaction must have ranged from horror to indignation to fear for their
lives - fear that they would now catch the dread disease.
But the leper was not
the only one to break the Law in this story. Jesus - in allowing the
leper to approach him, and then entering into a conversation with him,
and doing the unthinkable by actually reaching out and touching him -
Jesus also broke the law.
As so often in the
gospels, Jesus, a devout Jew who revered the Law, simply refused to be
bound or straight-jacketed by the Law. Everything he does in this
encounter makes it clear that people are more important to him than
laws, no matter how sacred. So, moved with pity, he allows the leper to
come right up to him; he converses with him and goes even further by
touching him. Jesus knew that this poor outcast of a man who had been
living on the outer margins of society needed more than just physical
healing - that he also needed a human encounter, human contact, human
warmth. That’s why he did the truly unthinkable - reaching out and
touching him. In doing so, he not only gave him healing, he also gave
him love and acceptance. He welcomed him back to the community.
I
can’t help but think of Pope Francis and his efforts to reach out to
people in marriages not recognized by the Church, as well as his efforts
to affirm gay and lesbian people. He knows that many of them have been
treated like lepers and outcasts, and so he’s intent on doing everything
he can to reach out to them, to assure them that they are loved, part of
the family, part of the community, embraced by God’s love and worthy of
God’s blessing.
And none of this is
about flaunting the Law. Jesus may bend the Law from time to time, but
he also honors it – just as Pope Francis honors Church teaching. Jesus
shows that he honors the Law by telling the man to go and show himself
to the priest and to make the customary offering called for in the Law
of Moses. Somewhat curiously, he also tells him to keep quiet about the
healing. That’s most likely because he doesn’t want people to get a
skewed notion about the Messiah – that they might think he’s nothing
more than a wonder-worker.
But the healed leper
does not keep quiet. Once he is healed, he can’t contain himself. He
immediately goes about spreading the story. And that’s where this story
gets a fascinating little twist to it. The more the news gets out that
Jesus has healed a leper, the more he is swarmed wherever he goes.
Everyone wants a piece of him, everyone wants his healing touch - so
much so that, as Mark puts it, it becomes “impossible for Jesus to enter
a town openly” and he has to remain outside the towns in deserted
places. Do you see the twist here, the irony? It is no longer the leper
who has to dwell apart from the community: it’s Jesus. In a sense, Jesus
is now the leper!
My friends, the Jesus of
this story is the same Jesus we call out to from whatever sort of
leprosy holds us in its grip - fear, sin, selfishness, self-doubt,
alienation – it matters not. The leper’s prayer is our prayer: “Lord if
you will you can make me clean,” Lord, if you will you can calm my
fears, if you will you can set me free. And this is a prayer that Jesus
hears. He is always moved to pity by our prayer for help. He stretches
out his hand to us, touches us, and gently assures us, “I do will it. Be
healed.”
As with the leper, Jesus
puts us and our needs first, puts them before any laws or rules. He is
here now to welcome us as he did the leper. His Word is full of power
for our healing; his Eucharist is full of nourishment and strength for
our journey. Like the leper, let us approach him with confidence
and experience his healing touch!
Father Michael G. Ryan
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