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Reflection for the VI Sunday in ordinary time

Fr. Antony Kadavil reflects and comments on the readings at Mass for the sixth Sunday in ordinary time. He says that it is purity or holiness of soul coming from God that cleanses our lives.

Mk 1:40-45 Jesus Heals a Man With Leprosy

Gospel Exegesis:

Why did Jesus become “angry” and issue a “stern warning?” Most translations say that Jesus was “moved with pity” when he saw the leper who approached him. But some modern Bible scholars tell us that there are ancient manuscripts that indicate that Jesus was “angry” or even “indignant” when he was confronted by this leper, and that after healing him Jesus spoke sternly to him about showing himself to a priest.

A background study reveals that Jesus was not angered by the leper but by the social and religious conditions of the day. There may have been two reasons for this:

1) Jesus could have been angered by the unjust and inhuman social isolation and ostracism to which the lepers were subjected. In Jesus’ day, a leper had no right either to medical care or to other kinds of help from the community. In addition, the Book of Leviticus 13:1-2, 44-46 demanded that lepers wear the tattered clothes and uncombed, uncut hair of mourners (Note, Harper Collins Study Bible, p. 172). When meeting any “sound” person, a leper had to cover his mouth with one hand and shout out a warning of his/her own “unclean” condition. Lepers were taken away from their families and forced to live in leper colonies or in caves outside the city. Anyone suspected of having contracted leprosy was to be taken before a priest for examination. According to historians, in some cities Jews were massacred at the mere mention of the plague being in the area, even before it had actually arrived.” (René Girard, The Scapegoat). The rabbinic sayings compare the cure of leprosy to raising the dead. Thus, it would be no wonder if Jesus were angry about conventions that forced the leper to live like an animal, without rights or privileges.

2) Jesus could have been angered by the blasphemous religious explanation of the day that all leprosy was God’s punishment for grave sins.  Jesus was also angry at the way lepers were treated as cursed creatures by the Jewish religion which sanctioned such inhuman treatment for lepers. Lepers were not only considered physically loathsome but were looked upon as persistent sinners. Even if the lepers were cured, they had to submit to a ritual cleansing and purging of sin before they would be re-admitted to society. Jesus might well have been revolted by the whole notion that lepers were sinners beyond God’s embrace. That might be precisely why He healed the leper by “stretching out his hand, touching” the legally untouchable. By instructing the healed leper to go and show himself to the priest, Jesus may have been challenging the religious authorities to see that God’s healing grace is available to anyone who asks.

According to some Fathers of the Church, one reason Jesus promptly responded to the leper’s cry in today’s Gospel story, ignoring the Mosaic Law prohibiting touching a leper and thus becoming ritually unclean, is that Jesus identified himself with the man’s condition. Jesus dramatically identified himself with the sufferer in the total rejection and isolation waiting for him. The irony here is that Jesus risked becoming “unclean” Himself in order to make the leper clean. Just as he stretched out his hand to the leper and touched him and made him whole, Jesus stretched out his hands on the cross to make us whole. He touched the leper thus bridging the gap between what is clean and what is unclean, identifying himself with all lepers, with all who are ritually or socially unclean and isolated and with all of us sinners who are spiritually unclean and have no way to change our condition except through His sacrifice and mercy. Thus, He became “unclean” in the eyes of the law that we might be made clean. He allowed himself to be rejected by his family and people so that those who are separated from God might return to him and be healed.

A story about how we judge others as acceptable or not in the community:

This is a story about how we treat others on the basis of appearance – both real and supposed. In our society, looks aren’t everything. They are the only thing! No wonder if we get feelings of inferiority, looking at all those young, attractive and trim models and superstars in magazines and on TV commercials. As a result, we make rash judgments with far-reaching consequences, making people outcasts in the society. For example, who can live down an accusation of child abuse? Who can really live a normal life in the community if he or she is known to be HIV positive? Who can really walk about as one of us in this age of the war against terrorism if he/she comes from the wrong ethnic group, wears the wrong clothes, or has the wrong skin-color?

In today’s Gospel incident, Jesus challenges us to accept others unconditionally as our own brothers and sisters. (Our media gave little attention to those Catholic high-school girls who wore head-scarves in support of their innocent Muslim friends after Sept. 11, 2001). Jesus reaches out to touch us in this very Eucharistic celebration, making us whole and restoring our relationship with him and with one another. Then he grants us a share in his Divine life through the Holy Communion. Healed and graced by Jesus, we, like the leper are each compelled to tell our story, making public the good news that God saves sinners and welcomes them home.

1) We need to trust in the mercy of a forgiving God who assures us that our sins are forgiven and that we are clean. We are forgiven and made spiritually clean from the spiritual leprosy of sins when we repent of our sins. This is because God is a God of love who waits patiently for us. No matter how many sins we have committed or how badly we have behaved, we know God forgives us. The only condition required of us is that we ask for forgiveness with a repentant heart. We need only kneel before him and ask him, “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean” We are sure to hear his words of absolution, “Very well– your sins are forgiven, and you are clean” echoed in the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

2) We need to tear down the walls that separate us from others and build bridges of loving relationship. Jesus calls every one of us to demolish the walls that separate us from each other and to welcome the outcasts and the untouchables of society. These include homosexuals, AIDS victims, alcoholics, drug-addicts and marginalized groups such as the divorced, the unmarried, single mothers, migrant workers and the mentally ill. God’s loving hand must reach out to them through us. Jesus wants us to touch their lives. Let us pass beyond the narrow circles of our friends and peers and try to relate to those who may be outside the bounds of propriety. Let us re-examine the barriers we have created and approach God with a heart that is ready to welcome the outcasts in our society. Remember the old African-American children’s song reminding us that there is room for everyone in God’s Kingdom: “All God’s creatures got a place in the choir, some sing low and some sing higher. Some sing out loud on a telephone wire and some just clap their hands or paws or anything they’ve got.”

(Fr. Antony Kadavil)