These reflections are a result of more than 40 years of ministry as a Roman Catholic priest. Most of these years I spent in the Diocese of Charlotte which covers Western North Carolina. Now I am retired, and live in Medellín, Colombia where I continue to serve as a priest in the Archdiocese of Medellín.
Many gathered together so that there was no longer room for them,
not even around the door,
and he preached the word to them.
They came bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men.
Unable to get near Jesus because of the crowd,
they opened up the roof above him.
After they had broken through,
they let down the mat on which the paralytic was lying.
When Jesus saw their faith, he said to him,
“Child, your sins are forgiven.”
(Mk 2:1-12)
As a child, I loved this passage. I remember our Sunday School lesson with the picture of the four men on the torn up roof lowering their friend on the mat and Jesus looking up and seeing their faith.
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.
On leaving the synagogue
Jesus entered the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John.
Simon’s mother-in-law lay sick with a fever.
They immediately told him about her.
He approached, grasped her hand, and helped her up.
Then the fever left her and she waited on them.
(Mk 1:29-39)
It is very interesting that Simon Peter’s mother-in-law, after she was healed, she “waited on them.” The Greek term is the formal term for ministry from which we get the word diakonos (deacon--servant). She didn’t go about saying, “Look at me, I’ve been healed!” She served them—she was a “deacon” to them. I think of my good friend, Deacon Joan Marshall (1929-2004), from All Souls Episcopal Cathedral in Asheville, NC. Deacon Joan reached out to those no one else would welcome. She was an inspiration to me and to many others. I remember her with joy.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Receive the word of God, not as the word of men,
but as it truly is, the word of God.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
(1 Thes 2:13)
Yesterday, Pope Francis issued a Motu Propio (Spiritus Domini) that officially opened the ministries of Lector and Acolyte to women. This may seem a bit strange since most of us are accustomed to seeing women reading and serving at Mass. As Father Anthony Ruff, OSB, noted on his liturgy blog PrayTell (https://www.praytellblog.com/), “This is big.”
Brothers and sisters:
In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways
to our ancestors through the prophets;
in these last days, he spoke to us through the Son.
(Heb 1:1-6)
Jesus said to them,
“Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.”
(Mk 1:14-20)
Christian revelation remarkably declares that God has spoken to us human beings . . . by becoming one with us in the Son. And so our encounter with God through the Scriptures invites us to hear that Word as being addressed to us. So when Jesus calls his disciples, “Come follow me,” they drop everything and follow him.
