A leper came to him and kneeling down begged him and said,
“If you wish, you can make me clean.”
Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand,
touched the leper, and said to him,
“I do will it. Be made clean.”
The leprosy left him immediately, and he was made clean.
(Mk 1:40-45)
The late congressman John Lewis always talked about “good trouble,” by which he meant that change sometimes requires a little trouble. Pope Francis has a similar phrase when he says, “Hagan lío,” which is a nice Argentine way to say, “Shake things up!” Jesus was always making “good trouble.” Jesus was always “shaking things up” especially when it came to the lepers and all those that good church folks would avoid like the plague. In fact, when Jesus has encounters with the lepers, he’s usually alone. I guess it was bad enough for the disciples when Jesus sat down with the prostitutes and tax collectors, but when the lepers showed up, the disciples disappeared.
