It’s abundantly clear that
Scripture remains timely and relevant to modern life.
It deals with the big problems
that weigh on humanity throughout history.
Like suffering and death.
And it gets down to some
very specific problems.
Our Gospel from Mark today
speaks of problems with affordable health care.
Two thousand years ago.
We hear that [The
woman] had suffered greatly at the hands of many doctors
And had spent all that
she had.
Yet she was not helped
but only grew worse.
I wasn’t aware that the medical
industry was already so formally established back then.
We go back a lot further
than I realized in our quest for a good Affordable Care Act.
Our Gospel and our reading
from Samuel also talk of the timeless sorrow of death.
Suffering and sorrow and
pain that’s magnified for all with the death of a child.
And magnified yet again
for the parents of that child.
Two thousand years ago
Jairus desperately sought to keep his young daughter alive.
Three thousand years ago,
King David agonized over the death of his son, Absalom.
David’s torment shows how
deeply attached we can be to those we hold dear.
Even to a lost child who
has grown to become an adult.
Even to a lost child who
has been rebellious.
Even to a lost
child who has shown hostility toward us.
Hostility even
to the extreme point of trying to kill us.
Dread of
suffering and death is a timeless and integral part of our human nature.
That human
nature that Jesus chose to share with us.
But, as he
showed many times, he had the power to control those dreaded forces.
He sometimes
intervened for the sake of others.
And yet, he
himself willingly suffered and died.
He cured
thousands from disease, and defect, and deformity, and demons.
He even
intervened in cases of death.
Raising the
daughter of Jairus, the son of the widow of Nain, and Lazarus.
But they were
raised only as a temporary measure.
And not for
their own sake, but for the sake of those who mourned.
To ease the
suffering of Jairus, the widow, Martha and Mary.
Today, doctors and other
caring people do a lot to ease suffering.
Physical, mental,
emotional and spiritual suffering.
This is a continuation of
the healing that Jesus performed so many years ago.
Moved forward by God’s revelations
in science, and by dedicated servant-disciples.
By new medicines and
procedures and sometimes, still, by miracles.
We now have the power to
greatly ease suffering.
But suffering remains forever
a part of life.
Sometimes the only end to
suffering is death.
Death remains the inevitable,
ultimate end of this life.
Fortunately there is
a way we can help ourselves and others ease the sufferings of death.
Ease both the fear of
death and the pain of mourning.
And that is to build our trust
in God.
To remind ourselves,
convince ourselves, truly believe, that we are all children of God.
To trust that God, in His
great mercy, will somehow draw all of us to Himself.
Us and our lost loved ones.
Because, even more
perfectly than Jairus or David or us, God holds-dear every lost child.
Tuesday, 4th Week of Ordinary Time
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