Being Christ to others

After my break away you may be pleased to know that I am back and here is my Blog for the next week. 

There are a few things that strike me today in the Gospel and one is the word “Ephphatha” and as we discover through Mark’s Gospel this word means “Be opened.”  This is preceded with an action of touch. Jesus reaches out to touch the sick and the poor. Notice also that he does this action in private he draws the person away from the main crowd. Jesus does not want to draw attention to him. Jesus is not some TV evangelist wanting to draw the attention to him but he wants to give his full attention to those who needs him the most the poor and the sick. 

 So let us look at each of these ideas in turn. Often we say that we were touched by someone when they said a kind word or have done a kind thing. This shows the importance for human contact. I was very aware of this in seeing family in my trip to Australia. Modern technology like facebook and especially Skype are good but there is nothing like seeing the person face to face and giving them a hug of welcome and the bond in goodbye. Jesus uses touch in his healing ministry it helps to bond and unite us to each other. It helps to express love and gratitude when done appropriately.

In the Gospel there is also a challenge for us to be open to the needs of the poor and the sick to reach out and touch them. We can do this in many different ways. There is through the prayer for the sick and the poor by social action and by our compassion for those around us. Each of these brings about the love of God in the world. Jesus says that the poor will always be with us but that is not an excuse to do nothing. We need to have a healthy social conscience to help those around us and be Jesus to others. To reach out and help those who are in need. But, we need to be clear that there are many different kinds of poverty. There is the poverty not just those without money. There is those who are poor in spirit the depressed or lonely, those who are poor spiritually, those who are poor because of education. It comes in many shapes and sizes and we are challenged to respond to them all.  The challenge is to be rich in faith as we hear from the second reading today and be Christ to others. To empower the poor and help those who are sick we need to put on Christ and be Christ like. A prayer that was on the front of my Ordination card helps me is this task and it’s a prayer from St Teresa of Avila.

Christ has no body now, but yours.
No hands, no feet on earth, but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which
Christ looks compassion into the world.
Yours are the feet
with which Christ walks to do good.
Yours are the hands
with which Christ blesses the world."