Healing wounds

What Jesus was doing left the Baptist perplexed.  He was expecting a Messiah who would eradicate sin from the world and impose God’s rigorous judgment, not a Messiah dedicated to healing wounds and alleviating suffering.  From the prison of Machaerus he sends a message to Jesus:  “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”

Jesus gives him as an answer his life as a healing prophet:  “Go and tell John what you hear and see:
the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have the good news proclaimed to them.”  This is the true Messiah:  the one who comes to alleviate suffering, heal life and open a horizon of hope to the poor.

Jesus feels he is sent by a merciful Father who wants a more dignified and happy world for everyone.  That is why he devotes himself to healing wounds, curing illness and liberating life.  And hence, he asks everyone:  “Be merciful as your Father is merciful.”

Jesus does not see himself as someone sent by a harsh Judge to sentence sinners and condemn the world.  Hence, he does not frighten anyone with gestures of vindictiveness, but offers sinners and prostitutes his friendship and forgiveness.  And that is why he asks us all: “Stop judging, that you may not be judged.”

Jesus never heals in an arbitrary way or just to amaze.  He heals moved by compassion, seeking to restore life for those sick, dejected and broken people.  They are the first ones who should experience that God is a friend who advocates for a life of dignity and wholeness.

Jesus never insisted on the wondrous quality of his cures, nor does he think of them as easy prescription to eliminate suffering in the world.  He presented his healing activity as a sign to show his followers the direction their action should take in order to open up paths to that humanizing project of the Father, which he named “kingdom of God.”

Pope Francis affirms that “to heal wounds” is an urgent task:  “I see clearly that the thing the Church needs most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm the hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity ….  Heal the wounds, heal the wounds … [is] to start from the ground up.”  He then speaks of taking “responsibility for the people,” accompanying “them like the good Samaritan who washes, cleans and raises up….”  He also speaks of walking “through the dark night with”people, knowing “how to dialogue and to descend … into their people’s night, into the darkness, but without getting lost.”

When he entrusts his mission to his disciples, Jesus doesn’t imagine them as people with doctorate and position in the hierarchy, as liturgists or theologians, but rather as healers.  Their task will be two-fold:  to announce that God’s kingdom is at hand and to heal the sick.

José Antonio Pagola

December 15, 2013
3 Advent (A)
Matthew 11, 2-11