Mark
7, 31-37
6th
Trinity August
As
he was again leaving the region around Tyre, he went through the
country around Sidon to the Sea of Galilee in the middle of the
region of the ten cities of the Decapolis. They brought to him one who was deaf
and who spoke with difficulty, and asked him to lay his hands on him. And he
led him apart from the crowds by himself, laid his finger in his ears, and
moistening his finger with saliva, touched his tongue, and looking up to the
heavens, sighed deeply and said to him, “Ephphata, be opened.” His hearing was
opened and the impediment of his tongue was removed and he could speak
properly. And he commanded them not to say anything to anyone. But the more he
forbade it, the more they widely they proclaimed it. And the people were deeply
moved by this event, and said, “He has changed all to the good: the deaf he
makes to hear and the speechless to speak.
6th Summer Trinity
Mark 7: 31-37
Our eyes are on the front surface
of our body. Our ears, however, our hearing capacity, comes from somewhere
deeper. We can hear from more than one direction.
Last week’s gospel reading
depicted the healing of human sight. Through the interworking of Christ and the
soul who was ardent for healing, the human being was able to ‘look up and see
again’. Looking up, he saw Christ Jesus.
Today’s reading is the sixth step
of ten on the way toward Michaelmas. Today the healing of the human
constitution goes deeper. Here we have someone who can barely speak and cannot
hear. He is cut off. He has lost the ability to reach out and initiate his own
healing. His friends have to bring him to Christ. And interestingly, after he
is brought, Christ leads him apart and acts upon him in a way that is both
individual and intimate. Touch, and the fiery word ‘Ephphata’ – be
opened—address both body and soul.
Humanity today is in great danger
of being self-encapsulated, of being cut off from the world of earth, from the
world of the divine spirit, and from other human beings. Not only do we not see;
we also cannot hear the voices who would converse with us. We are spiritually
deaf.
Christ came to remove the
impediments that block our participation in conversation with the divine.
Indeed, he is still here, as the Angel of healing.
At the beginning of the Act of
Consecration of Man, a bell rings three times. The resonating tone awakens our
hearing, so that we can begin our conversation with the triune God, with the
Father, the Son, and the healing spirit. We ask for healing. We ask that our
prayers reach God’s ear. We ask for grace. And one day we may be healed enough
to hear the answer that St. John
of the Cross heard, when he asked God what grace was. The answer he heard was,
“All that happens.”[1]
For grace comes from all directions.
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