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We hear some very powerful words in the readings on the purpose of Man’s life. The first reading, from Book of Wisdom, says that,
“God formed man to be imperishable;
the image of his own nature he made him.
But by the envy of the devil, death entered the world,
and they who belong to his company experience it.”
If we pay close enough attention to our spiritual lives, you and I can also experience daily the effects of Death and Life in our own life. Take for example, this past week: the struggles, the fights—both internal or external—the sadness, the loneliness, the fears are in a way us experiencing the effects Death. Likewise, the moments of true joy, compassion, forgiveness, and transcendence are also a way of experiencing Life. So death is not something that happens to everybody else but me, or something that’ll eventually happen in a time completely irrelevant to this moment in my life. Death can also be experienced by the subtle suggestions of the evil one in our lives. Just like life can be truly experienced by the subtle suggestions of the Spirit in our lives.
Today’s story from the Gospel speaks of two women—two women on the brink of despair. One, a 12-year-old girl, daughter of Jairus; and the other, a woman who also for 12 years has suffered an illness. Note they’re both called “daughter.” One, the daughter of Jairus; the other, called daughter by Jesus himself. There are some resemblances between both stories; you can compare and contrast them, but overall, they are stories of a critical moment of despair.
Either directly or indirectly both women approached Jesus as a last resource. So let’s take the first one. Jairus, is a synagogue official, the head administrator and president of the board of elders who coordinates all the services. He’s one of the men in charge. You could even say that he was one of the people who believed that Jesus was a heretic, an instigator, starting up a revolt.
Representing the synagogue, he took that formal position, but in his despair, he had to abandon all those positions, probably put his work on the line, and seek Jesus out for the sake of his daughter. Everything’s on the line and as a last resource he looks for Jesus.
And then there’s the hemorrhaging woman who’s been declared unclean. For 12 years she’s been struggling with this illness. She has spent all her money. She has probably lost her husband and her children because of her being declared unclean. She was shunned, ostracized by society. Imagine the suffering—social, spiritual, and personal—that this woman had experienced: she had lost everything. See, any form of blood discharge of the body was a reason to be declared unclean—Remember when Mary went to the temple for purification after giving birth to Jesus? Well, this woman, for 12 years could not find a cure; and the reason behind that was the belief that it was a sin in her life or in the lives of her parents or grandparents that she was carrying. So the root cause was believed to be a spiritual illness. People would stay away from her, literally, like a leper. That’s probably why she hid from everybody in the crowd. That’s probably why she approached Jesus “from behind.” Maybe she was afraid that Jesus would also pull back in disgust.
But there was something pushing her. “If I only touch his cloak, I will be healed.” And so, making her way through the crowd—making sure nobody would see who she was—she touched Jesus. The Gospel says that Jesus “felt a power leave him” and the woman felt that, also immediately, the blood flow was cut off, dried up. Jesus turns around, “Who touched me?” he says. He knows very well who touched him, but he probably wants the woman to recognize that HE was the cause.
What is it that healed this woman? It wasn’t a magic cloak. It wasn’t even her point of despair. “Daughter, your faith has made you clean.” Your faith has healed you. It was the faith of this woman in Jesus that healed her, symbolized in her touching his cloak.
It’s no wonder that the words health, holiness, and wholeness all share the same root word. It’s about being whole, being one. So in this story of despair and of how Jesus Christ brings healing and holiness to these two women, I’d like to invite you to reflect on your illnesses. Maybe there’s something in your life, in your childhood, in your adolescence or in your present day life that has you immobilized like the girl;  an illness perhaps, like the hemorrhaging woman, that has been a source of shame for you, of embarrassment; something that in your eyes has made you unclean, that has dragged on for years, something in your life that maybe has eroded your hope—your hope in yourself, your hope for life, your hope probably even in God and in the power of Christ Jesus.  Think of that something that has been the source of your physical or personal or spiritual illness.
A child went to the zoo with his dad. He marveled at all the animals: the giraffes, the alligators, the gorillas. They finally get to the elephants. They see them throw beach balls around and juggle. They stand on two legs and bow. The show finishes and the elephants settle down. The kid notices that this huge beast, this thousand-pound animal is tied up by a little rope attached to this ankle to a wooden stake, probably nailed only a couple of feet into the ground; and the kid was astonished. Then he sees that, save for a two-feet tall wall, there is nothing else holding back the animal. He asks his dad, “doesn’t an animal this size just give a strong tug to the stake and be set free? Why doesn’t he just step over the wall?” His dad had no response. They make their way back home and the child forgets about the issue, until it’s time for him, as a grown man, to take his own son to the zoo.
He’s compelled to ask the trainer, and retells the story:
“I discovered that to my luck, someone had been sufficiently wise to come up with the answer. The circus elephant does not escape because it has been attached to a stake just like this one, since it was very, very small. I closed my eyes and imagined a defenseless baby elephant fastened to the stake. I’m sure that in that moment the little guy pushed and pulled and tired himself out trying to get himself free, and regardless of his efforts, he couldn’t do it because the stake was too strong for him.
I imagined him tiring himself out and falling asleep, and the next day trying again and the next day and the next, until one day, a terrible day in his history, the animal accepted its utility and resigned itself to its fate. That enormous powerful elephant that you see in the circus does not escape because, unfortunate thing, he thinks that he cannot. He has that memory etched into his mind, and the worst part is that he has never returned to seriously question that memory. Never again did he return to test his own strength.”- J.L. Bucay
You and I can also have those little wooden stakes that bind us down: those beliefs that compel us to think that anything other than resignation is futile struggle. Maybe like the hemorrhaging woman, we also believe that we have spent all our resources and there probably isn’t a cure. Probably, like Jairus, we believe that our child, our daughter, is going to die and we are tied by fear. It’s those things in our lives that manage to bind us to a limiting belief, a preconditioned way of thinking that enslaves us and incapacitates us to hope. We forget that Jesus Christ has the power to overcome death and offers us nothing less than that freedom.
Like the woman, we need to overcome the shame, the embarrassment, and come up, encouraged, to touch his cloak. I say encouraged because the root word of courage, comes from cor, heart. To live a life of faith is to live a life of courage, a life with heart. If we live life with heart, we need somebody to love, to trust, someone greater and stronger than our poor muscles—that is trust in Christ Jesus and his message. Trust in that he gives us life even as we can experience death. The trust in that the daughters and sons of the Father are made for such great things. Trust that in him we will eventually have the strength to give that stake a good pull, to give that small barrier a good kick, and find true freedom. Fear can be one of those small wooden stakes that limit us to grow. It’s no wonder that Jesus tells the people around Jairus’s daughter, “Do not be afraid. She’s not dead. She’s only asleep.”
What was their conditioned way of thinking about Jesus? Probably, This man is lost. This girl is dead. The Gospel even tells us that “they mocked him.” They laughed at him.
How would your life look like without fear? Imagine your life as a fully committed disciple of Jesus Christ. Now I’m not saying to pick up a microphone and go to downtown Floresville and start proclaiming the Kingdom in the public spaces. In your same life, your same workplace, your same family, your same school, but committed and trustful to the person and message of the Son of God.
How would your life be transformed if you went all in in believing in Jesus Christ? If you trusted in him wholeheartedly with courage, with heart? With what freedom would you experience Life? How free would you be of the experience of Death? What could possibly bring you down? “If God is with us, who could possibly be against us?” (Rom 8:31). Mary, you were the first disciple of Jesus. Show us the great joy and freedom that it is to trust in him. Show us the courage to persevere, to come up to him and touch his cloak and become disciples of Christ.
Sacred Heart of Jesus, we trust in you.
This post is also available in: Spanish
