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Saturday, 13 February 2021 10:36

The Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time - 2021

 

Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

 

Year B

Readings: Leviticus 13:1-2,44-46; 1 Corinthians 10:31-11:1; Mark 1:40-45

If you want to

Fr Prakash Menezes SVD 150The person suffering with leprosy, in today’s Gospel, takes the initiative to come to Jesus, and in a way, puts the ball in Jesus’ court and says, “If you want to, you can cure me.” It must have taken an enormous leap of faith from his part, first, to come into the community, from which he is banished due to his sickness (today’s first reading from the book of Leviticus (13:1ff) talks about how the person with leprosy should be treated); second, to make sure that Jesus can heal him, not just heal him from his physical ailment, but also from the emotional and physical abuse he has suffered due to the illness.

Jesus, on the other hand, ‘feels sorry’ for him, that is to say, he feels compassion for him and wants him cured, wants him to become whole again and wants him to be accepted back into the community, so Jesus says, “Of course I want to! Be cured.” And he does this by touching the person. Strong and clear words of healing and a gentle gesture of assurance; ‘I want you to be cured, I want you to be accepted back, I want you to become whole again and I want you to be brought back into your family and loved ones.’

The healing of the person with leprosy has a lot of symbolism for us in our modern day living. We all know that the leprosy can be treated with modern medicine and through many awareness campaigns, not many leprosy patients are ostracised today. Leprosy is not something to be afraid of and no person need to be banished from the community. On the other hand, do we have people banished from our society because they are different from us? Have we banished someone because they have different approach to life than we have? Have we banished people form fully participating in Church’s life because they are ‘living in sin’? Aren’t we still ostracising people because of their colour, sex, sexual orientation, beliefs, ethnicity, sickness and so on? It is not just the physical disease that needs to be cured but also the emotional, psychological and spiritual ailments need to be addressed, and that is what Jesus does today to the person with leprosy.

How can we be the healers in our society? How can we stop being ‘banishers’ and become ‘uniters’? How can we reach out and touch people in their disabilities and try to make them whole again? It is work in progress, dear friends, and the underlying principle is to feel ‘compassion’ as Jesus felt towards the person with leprosy.

Let us, then, pledge today to walk in the path of Jesus. Let us look around us and see if we, as a community, are ostracising anyone. Let us reach out to them and gently touch them in their situation. Let us raise them up and work towards bringing them back into the community. Let us work towards making them whole again and in the process, we ourselves, become whole in the presence of God. Amen.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF COUNTRY

In the spirit of reconciliation, the Society of the Divine Word, Australia Province, acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea, sky, and community.

We acknowledge their skin-groups, story-lines, traditions, religiosity and living cultures.

We pay respect to their elders, past, present, and emerging, and extend that respect to all indigenous peoples of New Zealand, Thailand, and Myanmar.

We are committed to building with them, a brighter future together.