"I was dead, but Jesus has made me live!"

Listening to the Spirit

PRAYER FOR THE YEAR OF MISSIO AD GENTES

God, our loving Father, you sent your Son into the world to proclaim the Good News of Salvation to all: to sinners, the poor, oppressed, the sick, the abandoned and neglected.

He gave his life on the Cross for us and rose again to new life to redeem us and reconcile us with you. You sent your Holy Spirit to the apostles to continue the work of your Son and to lead all to salvation.

We thank you, Father for bringing us from darkness into light.

Through your loving plan, 500 years ago, missionaries came to our land to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus your Son to our ancestors. That made us your people and the Church.

The gift of faith has accompanied us through both darkness and lights, defeats and victories of our history as your people. Our faith has become for us true light that shines in the darkness.

Renew in us the grace of your Spirit that impels us to be witnesses of Jesus your Son, to a world broken by greed, violence, injustice, sickness and suffering.

May our faith bring us to unity as your children to care for and love one another.

May the Holy Spirit empower us to be proclaimers of the Good News

to our brothers and sisters in Asia and to all nations.

Give us the sincere desire to help others to come to faith in the Lord Jesus, to share your joy and life.

May the Blessed Mother, Star of Evangelization, accompany us and pray for us as we live and share our faith with others. May our strong love and devotion to her as our Mahal na Ina form us to be true disciples and witness of Jesus to all, always ready to be sent and to be obedient to whatever Jesus asks of us.

We ask this through Jesus Christ your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God forever and ever. Amen.

Listening to the Word

Mk 1:40–45

A leper came to Jesus and kneeling down begged him and said, "If you wish, you can make me clean." Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand, touched him, and said to him, "I do will it. Be made clean." The leprosy left him immediately, and he was made clean. Then, warning him sternly, he dismissed him at once. He said to him, "See that you tell no one anything, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses prescribed; that will be proof for them." The man went away and began to publicize the whole matter. He spread the report abroad so that it was impossible for Jesus to enter a town openly. He remained outside in deserted places, and people kept coming to him from everywhere.

Reflection

The first step in the cure is to acknowledge the disease. Nobody can be cured if he or she is not aware of or denies the illness. The second step is to go to the right doctor since an oculist cannot cure a heart disease: orthopedic is for bones, the dentist is for teeth,… and Jesus is for our souls' diseases.

This leper is aware of his disease. It couldn't be otherwise, since leper is not only a devastating disease but also the cause for ostracism within society and religion. The leper is destined to self-isolation, a kind of permanent quarantine, living far from other people, and also from God. The leper is aware that he cannot get out of his problem but recurring to the intervention of God. It is for this that he kneels in front of Jesus and begs him to be willing to cure him.

It is interesting to notice that the leper begins his request to Jesus by saying "if you wish!". He is aware of the divine power of Jesus, but his question is: “does the Almighty God love me, a leper? I know that God has the power of curing me, but will He do so?” The question, therefore, is about the love of God for the miserable, the ostracized, the poor, the sick, the sinners, the abandoned… Does God love them, or, just anybody else, loves only the good ones, the clean, the healthy… the saints. The question at stack is about the image of a God. Is He the Just one who hates the wicked, since "The LORD watches over all who love him, but all the wicked he will destroy" (Ps. 145:20) or the Father of Jesus, the God of Love and mercy, who "causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous." (Matt. 5:45)?

Jesus' reply "I do will it. Be made clean" is not just the answer to the leper's request, but a real revelation of the identity of God. God is love, and his only will is to restore our humanity to its fullness. His desire is not the condemnation of the wicked, but rather their conversion, that is becoming aware of the immense love for them, a love that can rebuild our communion with God and their brothers and sisters, a communion which symbolically is represented by healing leprosy.

Finally, Jesus sternly commands the cured leper not to tell anybody what happened, because Jesus did it not for being recognized by people. The only purpose of the miracle is the pure love for the person in need. Yet, the healed cannot refrain from sharing this experience of immense joy, and, perhaps, could not hide the evidence of being cured, since his sound body was talking by itself! This healed person suddenly became a missionary, an evangelizer. He does not become a "preacher" or a "teacher", but a person who speaks of his own Good News, with the authority of his own story and experience: "I was dead, but Jesus has made me live!"