Yesterday evening our parish celebrated Mass followed by a healing service. We had a good crowd of folks who sought healing for themselves and for others. My homily follows.
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Readings: 2 Tim 2:8-15 • Psalm 25 • Gospel: Mk 12:28-34
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Good evening, everyone. Praise God. Praise
Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
And thank God for His Presence here tonight, and
especially for His Holy Spirit Who does God’s healing work in the world.
You know, when you read the four Gospels carefully, you soon come to realize that Jesus actually healed thousands of people during His public ministry. We’re told very little, almost nothing, about the vast majority of these healings. We’re simply told that Jesus cured everyone who came to Him...and that, again and again, He spent hours healing those who suffered from every kind of disease or disability, giving sight to the blind, freeing others from evil spirits. This steady crowd of people came to Jesus in their sufferings, or they took others to Him, and He cured them all.
And yet the Gospel provides details on just a few of these healings. In almost every instance, these healings, these details reveal something important about the human condition, about faith, about God’s love for us and the response He expects from us.
In a sense, these physical healings are almost byproducts of something far greater. They are signs pointing to the deeper spiritual needs of all those who come to Jesus. They also point to the gift of faith God offers to each of us, to the depth of His love for us, and to need for a response. And that response is beautifully described in today’s Gospel passage from Mark.
Mark tells us of a scribe who comes to Jesus with a question. It’s no secret that many scribes and Pharisees were very hostile to Jesus. This is evident throughout the Gospel. But not every scribe and Pharisee. John, for example, tells us of Nicodemus, a Pharisee who came to Jesus seeking the truth.
And in today’s passage the scribe who approached Jesus seemed anything but hostile. Was he, like so many others, simply testing Jesus, seeing if He would say something that could be used against Him later? It doesn’t seem so. Indeed, he seems to be honestly seeking the answer to a question that centers on a subject of real disagreement among learned Jews. He asks Jesus: “Which is the first of all the commandments?” Jewish Law included over 600 commandments. Which of these was “the first,” the most important?
Without hesitation Jesus goes deep into the
Torah. He turns to chapter 6 of Deuteronomy and to a key portion of the Shema,
the very centerpiece of Jewish prayer, and replies:
“The first is this: Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God,
the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with
all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”
But Jesus doesn’t stop there. He then turns
to Leviticus, chapter 19, and adds another:
“The second is this: You shall love your
neighbor as yourself.”
The scribe seemed pleased with the answer and expressed full agreement. Our Lord, in turn, tells the scribe: “You are not far from the Kingdom of God.” Did this scribe become a disciple? Mark doesn’t tell us, but I’ve always believed he did.
By including two commandments in His answer, Jesus reveals that the two are inseparable. Yes, loving our God is first, but we must also love our neighbor, made in God’s image and likeness. Jesus later refined this law, making neighbor all-inclusive, as described in His parable of the Good Samaritan. We are called to love, to love everyone, and to ensure we understand, Jesus offers His life for us, for all of humanity, on the Cross.
This, then, is what God expects of us.“No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s friends.” [Jn 15:13]
Isn’t it wonderful how God likes to keep things simple, especially the truly important things. If you want to complicate something, just give it to a human, and you can be sure we'll make it unintelligible. God, on the other hand, tells us, “Just do this and all will be well: Love God and love each other.”
I said it was simple, and it is. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Yes, indeed, it’s hard to focus all our attention on God and neighbor when we’re so wrapped up in ourselves. So, then, what does all this have to do with healing? Actually, quite a lot.
Many of you are here tonight to seek healing. Some seek physical healing because you’re suffering from a life-altering illness or disability. Others are here to plead for the healing of another, whether physical, mental, spiritual or all three. Some of you may be suffering through a spiritual crisis and seek the grace to resolve it. We’re come here this evening for a variety of reasons, but every single one of us needs healing of some sort.
That leads to my central theme: the merging of healing and love. I think this merger was best described by that great American storyteller, Flannery O’Connor. She was a Catholic girl from Georgia, who wrote remarkably unforgettable short stories and novels of sin, repentance, forgiveness, and salvation. She died in 1964 at the age of 39 after a battle with lupus that lasted her entire adult life. But in the midst of it all, she wrote:
“You will have found Christ when you are concerned with
other people’s suffering and not your own.”
Yes, as I said earlier, love is simple, but it ain’t easy. For example, how many of you, right now, are pleading with God to heal those seated all around you tonight? I know, it’s not easy to look beyond oneself when you’re really hurting.
Some years ago, while making my rounds as chaplain of the day at The Villages Hospital, I entered the room of one of our parishioners. A widower with a serious illness, he was lonely and afraid. As I prayed with him for healing, he didn’t seem all that comfortable with the whole process. His expression gave it away -- one of those "waste of time" looks. Anyway, before leaving I gave him a blessing and told him I’d add him to the parish prayer needs list. “Oh, no,” he said. “I don’t want people to know I’m sick. I’d like to keep it quiet.”
Now Diane and I usually ministered together as co-chaplains, but she couldn't join me that day. As expected, without her to stop me, I did something dumb.
“Oh, okay,” I said and left his room.
After visiting a few more patients, I entered another room to find it crowded with visitors. I said I’d return later, but the patient, an elderly woman, said, “Don't leave. Come on in and join the crowd.” So, I did. And it certainly was a crowd: family, neighbors, members of her Baptist church, her pastor...and now me.
Introducing herself, she laughed, “I’ve got so many things wrong with me, they don’t know where to start. But I can’t complain; God’s let me live a lot longer than I ever expected.” I asked if I could pray with her, and the whole crowd joined hands. We prayed for healing and peace, for doctors and nurses. We thanked God for friendship and for the gift of discipleship, for those who listen to the Lord when He says, “I was…ill and you cared for me…”
Before leaving, I remarked that she was blessed to have so many people caring and praying for her. “Yes,” she said, “I am blessed. Their prayers let me know that I am loved, that I belong.”
Listening to her I was reminded of Simone Weil, a brilliant, young
French philosopher, who escaped from the Nazis. She once wrote:
“Love of God is pure when
joy and suffering inspire an equal degree of gratitude.”
Yes, two very different people, Simone Weil, born Jewish, but
Catholic by conviction, who died in exile in 1943 at the age of 33; and this 91-year-old Baptist woman in central Florida – and yet they both came to know and accept this truth about the love of God.
When I left her room, I returned to the room of our parishioner, and sat down next to his bed, and said something like this:
You are lonely and afraid. But God wants you to love and be loved. He wants you joyful, even in your illness, not fearful. Don’t let pride separate you from others. Baptism made you an adopted child of the Father, a member of the Church, the community of the faithful. The prayer of that community brings healing and the joy promised by the God who loves you. By letting the parish community pray and care for you, you further God’s plan for their salvation and that of the world.
Anyway, after my little Spirit-inspired homily, he agreed to be prayed for. As I left, I asked him to pray for Alice, the Baptist woman down the hall. He looked confused, so I said, “Just pray for her. Her joy will bring you healing.”
And I think of these two patients now as I stand here before this community of the faithful. We are gathered in communion, gathered in Jesus’ holy name, in His Eucharistic presence; and through that communion we are graced with healing today.
Accept God’s presence here. Don’t resist the Spirit. Let Him move where He wills within you. Open your heart to Him today. For it’s through the Spirit, through Him alone, that you will receive the healing God wants for you, that you will come to know God’s will for you.
God’s command to love God and neighbor, calls you and me to be both healed and healer. Yes, indeed, each of us is called to be a healer in need of healing. Pray for all these others, here and elsewhere, who seek the healing power of God. And realize, God always heals the human spirit first. In our sinfulness we need healing of the soul, for only that can bring us eternal life.
What does our love for God and neighbor yield? St. Paul said it
best in perhaps his most famous words:
We know that all things work for good for those who love God, who are called according. [Rom 8:28]
God 's peace.
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