Lessons from a Blind Man

A blind man was invited to attend a friend’s wedding. The couple were being married in a village church that was well known for its picturesque qualities and its beautiful grounds. The guests commented on all of this at the reception afterwards and again when the photos came back. They were struck by how well the church, the grounds and the setting all looked. When the blind man heard all this talk he thought to himself, ‘But didn’t they hear the bell?’ For him, the bell that pealed to welcome the bride and celebrate their marriage had been magnificent. The air was filled with its vibrating jubilation. He was amazed at the atmosphere of joy and solemnity that the bell created for the occasion. Everyone else seemed to have missed that part of the ceremony. Although he could not see, perhaps because he could not see, his hearing was very alert. He heard the beauty that others missed. The sounds that passed others by touched him very deeply.

This morning’s gospel is the story of a blind man, a blind beggar. Although he was blind, his hearing was very sensitive. The gospel says that he heard that Jesus of Nazareth was passing by. Although he could not see Jesus passing by, he made contact with Jesus through his sense of hearing. His finely tuned hearing to the presence of Jesus led him to using another sense to make contact with Jesus, his sense of speech. He cried out, ‘Jesus, Son of David, have pity on me.’ Even when people around Jesus, including perhaps some of Jesus’ disciples, told him to keep quiet, he shouted all the louder, ‘Son of David, have pity on me.’ Even though he could not see Jesus, he was determined to make contact with him through his gift of speech, through his urgent prayer from his heart. His prayer was an act of faith on his part. He recognized Jesus as ‘Son of David’ which was one of the titles for the Messiah, and trusting that Jesus could heal his blindness. His making contact through his hearing and his speaking revealed that he had an inner sight. Even though he was blind, he saw Jesus with the eyes of faith. Even when he was rebuked by the crowd for confessing his faith out loud, he refused to be silenced. He had the courage to keep professing his faith, in spite of the hostility and scorn it brought upon him. This man’s courage faith and the quality of hearing, and speaking and seeing it gave rise to may have something to teach us when professing our faith publicly can invite scorn.

This man’s faith literally brought Jesus to a standstill, in spite of the fact that at this point in his ministry he was hurrying from Jericho to Jerusalem. The gospel says simply, ‘Jesus stopped.’ Jesus’ response to the heartfelt prayers of this man was in complete contrast to that of the people around him. Rather than telling him to keep quiet, Jesus told those around him to call him over. Jesus is portrayed as the champion of those not considered worthy enough to come near to God. Again we witness the extraordinary responsiveness of this man to Jesus’ presence, to the call of Jesus. When he heard that Jesus was calling him, he first of all threw off his cloak. His cloak, no doubt, served many purposes. He sheltered him from the weather; it was his bed; it was in a sense his home. Yet, he abandoned it, and having done so, he jumped up and went unerringly to Jesus in his blindness.

Nothing was going to hold him back from connecting with Jesus, not even his precious cloak. He speaks to all of us of our own need to free ourselves of the binds that stifle our faith and keep us from approaching the Lord. The question that Jesus asked him when they came face to face was not the kind of dismissive question that comes from annoyance at being interrupted, ‘What do you want?’ Rather, it was a very personal question ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ It is a question that we can all hear as addressed to each of us personally, and how we answer that question can reveal a great deal about who we are and what we value. In the passage in Mark’s gospel which immediately preceded this one, Jesus asked that same question of two of his own disciples, James and John, ‘What do you want me to do for you?’ Their answer revealed a self-cantered ambition, ‘Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory?’ The blind man’s answer to Jesus’ question revealed a very different heart. Aware of his blindness, aware of his disability, he asked simply, ‘Master, let me see again.’ In answering his prayer, Jesus addressed him as a man of faith, ‘your faith has saved you.’ He was already seeing Jesus with the eyes of faith before he received back his physical sight. Once he received back his physical sight, we are told that he followed Jesus along the road. He immediately used his newly restored sight to walk after Jesus as a disciple up to the city of Jerusalem, where Jesus would be crucified. His faith had shaped his hearing and his speaking, and now it shaped the path he would take. In this Year of Faith that Pope Benedict has decreed we could do worse than take this man as a model of faith for the year. Like him we are blind beggars who need to keep on crying out to the Lord who passes by so that we can see him more clearly and follow him more nearly. [Martin Hogan]

 

Source: http://www.associationofcatholicpriests.ie/2015/10/25th-october-30th-sunday-ordinary-time/

 

God Bless
Nathan

Willingness to Serve

The theme of the willing servant matches the missionary ideal perfectly. The ideal missionary is so devoted to the good of the people whom s/he is sent to serve that they plan both their activities and their life-style to match the real needs of those people. There is a huge effort of adaptation and enculturation involved, so that the Gospel can integrate into the lives of the local people. This goes well beyond the initial need to learn the local language, and the most effective symbols to use, so that the message of Jesus can be understood and loved.

In our world, where most of the celebrities highlighted in the media seem motivated by self-interest and self-assertion Jesus’ call to total service seems unrealistic, and, one might think, unlikely to succeed. But today’s Gospel offers the ideal of dedication to the service of others as fundamental to Christian discipleship. Jesus came “not to be served, but to serve” and this example must always be a guiding light for his followers. He went about doing good (cf. Acts 10:38), bringing justice, healing, forgiveness and kindness into people’s lives. This is why those who believe in him are challenged to give themselves, their talents and their time, to the service of others without seeking any other reward than knowing that this is supremely worthwhile. The acted parable of the foot-washing at the Last Supper gives out the same message.

In practice what can we learn from our Lord’s life and actions? He clearly said that he came to do the Father’s will, and this thought stayed with him, even when it led to suffering and a cruel death. He was always about the Father’s business, and made it his business. This prompts us too, with an active sense of duty, and a personal dedication to God’s will for us. Normally, we discover our duty and God’s will for us, not in world-changing plans or in heroic ideals but in the ordinary tasks of each day. At home or in the office, or the school or other workplace, or wherever the activity of the moment calls us, we try to be aware of duty and a sense of dedication. Whenever we work in a slipshod manner, of fail to offer the needed helping hand, we fall below our personal call to service. What a change it would make, if there was a widespread return to this spirit, with regard to people’s daily work. We need to be reminded that in rendering to others the service of a job well done we are imitating the serving Christ and being his fellow-workers in building up the kingdom of God on earth.

It is tempting to be selfish with our time and energy. There are so many plausible excuses for excluding ourselves from the work that needs to be done. How easy to join the many who just live for themselves and let society fend for itself. But today’s Scripture calls us to examine our conscience, and to face the question, “What can I do for my community, rather than what can my community do for me?” It is one of the most basic values we have to keep on learning throughout our lives. The approach of James and John, in today’s Gospel, is not unlike the way many of us come to God. We approach him in prayer with the greatest fervour, whenever we want something for ourselves. Jesus responds to their request with a request of his own, thereby showing that what he wants for us must take priority over what we want for ourselves. The only request worth making is that which he taught us to make, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Mt 6:10.) His will, as expressed in today’s Gospel, is that we should share in his cup and in his baptism, that cup which he was to ask the Father to take from him (Mk 14:36), and that baptism of fire which he knew he had to undergo. His death on the cross was but the final expression of that total service which characterised the whole of his life. Everyday he died to himself, because he lived “not to be served, but to serve.” His life was a daily emptying of self (Phil 2:7), a self-emptying which was only complete when he gave his last breath on the cross The complete missionary!

 

Source: http://www.associationofcatholicpriests.ie/2015/10/18th-october-29th-sunday-mission-sunday/

 

God Bless
Nathan

Divinity of Christ

Evidence for the Divinity of Jesus Christ in the Early Church Fathers
complied by Marcellino D’Ambrosio, Ph.D.

 

The DaVinci Code repeats the old claim, by the Jehovah’s Witnesses and Others, that no one believed in the Divinity of Jesus Christ in the early Church, but that this idea was invented and promulgated by the emperor Constantine who gained control of the Roman Empire in 312 AD.  This historical claim in absolute nonsense.  The following texts from Christian writers who lived between New Testament times and the reign of Constantine make abundantly clear that belief in Christ's divinity and equality with God the Father is an indisputable part of the Christian tradition from the beginning.  These quotes demonstrating belief in Jesus' divine as well as human nature are by no means exhaustive – they are just a very limited selection.  Most or all of the direct quotes below come from the collection edited by Cyril Richardson entitled Early Christian Fathers (NY: Macmillan, 1970), abbreviated here as ECF.

A.Ignatius of Antioch, on the Divinity of Christ, calls Jesus God 16x in 7 letters (ca. 110 AD)

 

1. “Jesus Christ our God” Eph inscr, Eph 15:3, Eph 18:2, Tral 7, Ro inscr 2x, Ro 3:3, Smyr 10:1.

2. He speaks of Christ’s blood as “God's blood” Eph 1:1

3.  He calls Jesus “God incarnate” Eph 7:2

4.  In Jesus “God was revealing himself as a man”  Eph 19:3

 

B. Epistle to Diognetus (ca. 125 AD) speaking of God the Father, he says:

1. Diognetus 7:2  "he sent the Designer and Maker of the universe himself, by whom he created the heavens and confined the sea within its own bounds" (ca. 125 AD)

2. Diognetus 7:4 “He sent him as God; he sent him as man to men."

 

C. Saint Justin Martyr on the Divinity of Christ (c. 155 AD)

1.   says that Christians adore and worship the Son as well as the Father.  1st Apology 6.

2.  says Christ, the Word incarnate, is divine 1 Apol 10 & 63

 

D. Irenaeus on Christ's Divinity (ca. 185) in his work Adversus Haereses (Against Heresies)

 

1. Of Jesus he says "He is the holy Lord, the Wonderful, the Counselor, the Beautiful in appearance, and the Mighty God, coming on the clouds as the Judge of all men; --all these things did the Scriptures prophesy of Him."  AH III.19.2 (Ante Nicene Fathers 1: 449).

2. "He, therefore who was known, was not a different being from Him who declared, 'No man knoweth the Father,' but one and the same, the Father making all things subject to Him; while He received testimony from all that He was very [true] man, and that He was very [true] God, from the Father, from the Spirit, from angels, from the creation itself, from men, from apostate spirits and demons, from the enemy, and last of all, from death itself."  AH, IV, 6,7 (ANF, 469).

Source:   https://www.crossroadsinitiative.com

 

God Bless
Nathan