21-Jun-2009 Dear Friend,
Every human being is called to be fully human and fully alive. The glory of God is to be vibrating and enthusiastic about life. Yet we know that in the midst of life we experience death, are confronted by sickness and sometimes life ebbs away slowly and we tend to give up and surrender to death. Morning after morning God opens my eyes and says: “Live! Come alive! Are we becoming more alive or slowly dying? Have a thankful weekend celebrating life even when confronted with moments of death! Fr. Jude Sunday Reflections: Thirteenth Sunday of the Year ‘The Lord who gives life!’ 28-Jun-2009 Wisdom 1: 13-15; 2: 23- 24; 2 Corinthians 8: 7-9. 13-15; Mark 5: 21-43; The author of the Book of Wisdom lived about the middle of the first century and was perhaps perplexed with the problem which many Old Testament writers grappled with, namely, how does God allow the prosperity of the wicked while the God-fearing people suffer many misfortunes. The solution proposed was that there would be a reversal of fortunes in the after-life. Today’s reading affirms that God is good and wants man’s happiness. No doubt there is the reality of death but its full impact will be felt only by the wicked. There is hope for the just beyond death. Palmerstone North Evening Standard When I was in New Zealand in 1973 I read this fascinating comment in a newspaper article by the Director of Radiotherapy and Radiology in that country: ‘Cancer makes people start thinking of their lives. Everything they do has a keener edge on it and they get more out of life. In fact, some people never became complete human beings and really start living until they get cancer. We all know we are going to die some time, but cancer makes people face up to it…. They are going to go on living with a lot of enjoyment, just because they have faced the fear of death. Cancer patients aren’t dying. They are living. I have never seen a suicide because of cancer.’ Anthony Castle in ‘Quotes and Anecdotes’ In the second reading from the letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians, Paul is speaking of the collection to be taken up for the mother churches of his time. Paul has two concerns that he expresses. One that the Corinthians be as generous as they possibly can be in the circumstances. Secondly that they do not feel under an obligation to help because he is asking them for help. They should give rather because they have received much from God and from him. Paul gives the example of Jesus Christ who gave himself to the point of death. Receiving in Giving I know a ranch in Colorado at the base of a mountain. From snowfields hundreds of feet above, two streams trickle down and divide. One grows until its waters are caught up by skilled engineers and made to irrigate a thousand ranches. The other runs into a blind valley and spreads into a lake with no outlet. There it poisons itself. In it are the carcasses of cattle who, thirsty and eager, have come to drink of the tainted flood. Some of them still stand upright in the miry bottom, their heads bent into the bitter tide, their flesh falling from their bones. The first lake has an outlet. It looses itself on a mesa and gives drink to the homes of men. The other turns upon itself and kills everything it touches. One looses life and finds it again in generosity; –the other looses life in stagnation, never to find it again. George Stewart Today’s gospel passage from St. Mark is in line with the theme of the first reading of how the tragedy of death is transformed by faith. We have the story of the healing of the daughter of Jairus, which is interrupted with the story of the healing of a woman who has been suffering from a haemorrhage for many years who is healed by touching Jesus with faith. Two details are worth observing. Jairus begged insistently and Jesus apparently without a word went with him. While they are on their way, a woman who had been suffering much for many years, who had heard of Jesus, came up behind him and touched his garment. She was hopeless and desperate and her action seems almost superstitious. “If I only touch his garment I shall be made well.” Her touch of faith heals her instantly. But Jesus wants to deepen her faith and so he confronts her: “Who touched my garments?” He says this not to expose her or embarrass her but to move her faith from mere superstition to a personal encounter with him. The woman came in fear and trembling and fell down before him and told the truth. Jesus said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace and be healed!” While he was still speaking to the woman, Jairus’ people come to report that his daughter is dead, so there is no need of troubling Jesus. Jesus hears what is being said and reassures Jairus, “Do not fear, only believe.” Jairus had just witnesses Jesus curing the sick woman, now his faith is put to the test. To cure the sick is one thing but to raise someone from the dead is unthinkable. Jesus goes to the house of Jairus accompanied only by Peter, James and John. Jesus refuses to create a sensation. Whenever possible he prefers to work his miracles in a discreet manner. Seeing the crowd outside weeping and wailing he said, “Why are you weeping and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep.” The crowd laughed at him. The faith of Jairus and the disciples was sorely tested. Jesus takes the child’s father and mother and his disciples inside and in the privacy of the home restores the child to life. “Tailtha cumi! Little girl, I say to you arise!” For Jesus, death is no longer death, it is a sleep before awakening. Like the little girl, often Jesus is calling out to us to arise from our sleep. The little girl arises and walks about and all the witnesses were filled with amazement. With Jesus we are raised from death to life. With and through Jesus we are healed. With Jesus we are lifted up and given the fullness of life. “We are invited today to reflect on the meaning of life and on hope in an existence that has no end. Life the reality in which we and our loved ones are immersed, a reality all the more to be marveled at since, in its fragility, it is subject to illness and must succumb to death, that inevitable limit. Is it possible to believe in life and hope, in spite of everything? The faith of Jairus whose twelve year old daughter at the point of death, the faith of the distraught woman whose life, along with her blood, has gradually been seeping from her these past twelve years – such should our faith be in its confident simplicity. The two stories, dovetailed, make a single point. The woman suffering from a hemorrhage, who furtively touches Jesus in the hope of being cured, has a native, almost a superstitious faith. Jesus does not despise her; rather he helps her to approach him in a personal way and so to transform her gesture into an action which saves and gives peace. Greater faith, even to the point of folly, is that of Jairus who has only his silence to set against the defeatism of the crowd. For them, it is only too clear that no one can do anything against death. For Jesus, death is simply a sleep which, through faith, opens out on a morning of resurrection. In his words, we catch the Christian interpretation of baptism as a participation in the resurrection of Christ: ‘Wake up from your sleep, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you’ (Eph 5:14).This must surely put us in mind of what Peguy said about the little girl whose name is Hope. In each one of us she lies asleep: she must be woken up regularly, made to get up and walk about. A wonder made possible only through faith in the one who can make our nights, even our darkest ones, open out on the morning of Easter. –Glenstal Bible Missal God Always Answers Our Prayers The waters of the dam had burst their banks, and a veritable tidal wave was heading towards the nearest town. The police drove up the main street, calling on all people to vacate their homes and to avail of the transport provided for a quick exit out of town. One man, who knew about the danger, refused the offer, because he has prayed to God and he felt it was now up to God to take care of him. Shortly afterwards, the waters came roaring down the main street, and all ground floors were under water. The man was forced to retreat upstairs. He was at a front window when a boat came by, and the people in the boat tried to persuade him to get in the boat and come with them to safety. Once again, the man insisted that he had asked God to help him, and that God would look after him. After some time the water rose so high that the man was forced to climb up on the roof. Soon a helicopter came along but, once again, he refused the offer of help, because God was going to take care of him. Anyhow, surprise! Surprise! The man drowned. He arrived at the gates of heaven in a very angry and belligerent mood and asked Peter, what happens when someone like him asks for help. This puzzled Peter, who explained that, yes, God always answers prayers. He brought out the logbook of prayer, asked the man his name, and began to check the records. After a while he looked at the man, and said, ‘Yes, there is a record here of your prayers. What puzzles me, though, is that there is also a record here of several answers to those prayers. It says here that we sent you the police, a group of people in a boat, and we even sent you a helicopter. Whatever happened to all that help? Didn’t they show up?’ Jack McArdle in ‘And that’s the Gospel truth!' Merchant of Death or Life? About eighty years ago a man picked up the morning paper and, to his horror, read his own obituary! The newspaper had reported the death of the wrong man. Like most of us, he relished the idea of finding out what people would say about him after he died. He read past the bold caption which read, “Dynamic King Dies,” to the text itself. He read along until he was taken aback by the description of him as a “merchant of death.” He was the inventor of dynamite and had amassed a great fortune from the manufacture of weapons of destruction. But he was moved by this description. Did he really want to be known as a “merchant of death”? It was at that moment that a healing power greater than the destructive force of dynamite came over him. It was his energy and money moved to works of peace and human betterment. Today, of course, he is best remembered, not as a “merchant of death,” but as the founder of the Nobel Peace Prize – Alfred Nobel. Anonymous Story to Heal Martin Buber tells the story of his paralyzed grandfather who was asked to relate a story about his great teacher, the famous and holy Baal Shem Tov. The grandfather replied by telling how the holy man used to jump up and down and dance when he was praying. Being swept up in the fervour of the narrative, the grandfather himself stood up and began to jump and dance to show how the master had done it. At that moment the grandfather was completely healed of his paralysis. Brian Cavanaugh in ‘The ‘Sower’s Seeds’ May we receive life and healing in giving more and more to others! Fr. Jude Botelho [email protected] PS. The stories, incidents and anecdotes used in the reflections have been collected over the years from books as well as from sources over the net and from e-mails received. Every effort is made to acknowledge authors whenever possible. If you send in stories or illustrations I would be grateful if you could quote the source as well so that they can be acknowledged if used in these reflections. These reflections are also available on my remodelled web site www.netforlife.net Thank you. Love Cricket? Check out live scores, photos, video highlights and more. Click here http://cricket.yahoo.com
