Gospel of 14 January 2021
Thursday of the First Week in Ordinary Time
Mark 1:40-45
The leprosy left the man at once, and he was cured
A leper came to Jesus and pleaded on his knees: ‘If you want to’ he said ‘you can cure me.’ Feeling sorry for him, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him. ‘Of course I want to!’ he said. ‘Be cured!’ And the leprosy left him at once and he was cured. Jesus immediately sent him away and sternly ordered him, ‘Mind you say nothing to anyone, but go and show yourself to the priest, and make the offering for your healing prescribed by Moses as evidence of your recovery.’ The man went away, but then started talking about it freely and telling the story everywhere, so that Jesus could no longer go openly into any town, but had to stay outside in places where nobody lived. Even so, people from all around would come to him.
Reflexion
Our Christmas liturgy, interestingly speaks of the greatest and most wondrous commerce. It is certainly not referring to the massive discounts, bargains as people go about their frenzied Christmas shopping. Rather, it speaks of the divine exchange that takes place on Christmas day – the Incarnation – the Divine Word, the Second Person of the Trinity, took our humanity in exchange for the gift of divinity. Certainly an unfair exchange. Thus the reason why we speak of its wondrous nature.
In exchange for the gift of eternal life, all that we need to offer the Lord, which the Blessed Virgin Mary did at the Annunciation, is our weak and suffering-prone human flesh, and our frail and fragile mortal lives. This is what we witness in today’s gospel story. Our Lord trades places with a leper.
Leprosy in our Lord’s time was not just a despicable virulent disease but also carried along with it the worst of religious and social stigmas. The disease was horrendous, no denying that. But it is compounded by the fact that you have no ability to interact with anybody but the people who also have the disease. We complain about our regime of social distancing but lepers were permanently kept at a distance except when among their own company.
But this leper violated all necessary standards of exclusion in his desperation. He came to the Lord beseeching Him, begging Him in desperation. His attitude was humble, respectful. Unlike so many who possess a delusional sense of entitlement, this man understood he could make no just claim on God or His Christ. He understood that God owed Him nothing. Rather than make demands of the Lord, the man offers a humble request, “If you want to.” The man's plight triggered our Lord’s compassion. Our Lord stretched out His hand and touched him and then said to him, “Of course I want to! Be cured!”
Now in Leviticus 5:3 there's a law forbidding anyone to touch a leper. But the Lord couldn't be defiled by anyone. His touch was a touch of compassion. His touch was a touch of connexion. It is the Lord linking Himself directly to the healing. Instantaneously and completely the leprosy left him and he was cleansed.
Our Lord instructed the man to show himself to the priests according to the Law. But the cured leper disobeyed these commands and instead went around to spread the news. The man's disobedience in spreading this everywhere had a negative effect on Jesus. It says in verse 45, “Jesus could no longer go openly into any town, but had to stay outside in places where nobody lived.”
In an ironical twist to the story, our Lord trades places with the leper. The social outcast is reconciled with the community and the very hero feted by the community now becomes an outcast of His choosing.
Our Lord did not only trade places with us at the Incarnation, He did it too on the cross. We are the spiritual lepers who lived in alienation and isolation from God. Leprosy is a symbol of sin. Is there any better physical picture of sin, which destroys the whole person, alienates, isolates, cuts people off from God and the community? But something happens when we encounter the Lord. In meeting Him, we are reconciled with God and brought into His presence in the Kingdom. Our Lord exchanged places with us, He traded places with us, He took our sin and our punishment, He became an outcast, He was forsaken for our sake in order that we might be received, accepted, cured and made into sons and daughters of the Almighty God. Let us never cease to be grateful for this great gift, this great exchange and commerce, knowing that we are always undeserving.