Word to the Wise
Thursday, January 11, 2024 - Thursday in the 1st Week in Ordinary Time
[1 Sam 4:1-11 and Mark 1:40-45,380]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 the leper, 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. Then 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." [Mark]
Lepers were more common in Jesus' day than in ours, at least in the USA today. One did not have to have Hansen's Disease, the true clinical leprosy, to be declared a leper. Even a house could have leprosy! For humans, in the Old Testament, the description and treatment (by the priest!) is described in Leviticus 13-14. This could be any number of dermatological problems. The upshot was isolation. Jesus' response to the leper had more than a clinical outcome, it had a social outcome as well. The former leper was restored to his family and community! Why shouldn't he make it known? Why would Jesus tell him not to publicize such a wonderful thing?
Here we turn to the story-teller. The "big picture" in the Gospel According to Mark holds that one cannot understand Jesus except from the perspective of his death and resurrection. So, the key to everything is at the "end" of the story and not at the beginning. The leper shows some faith in kneeling before Jesus, but Jesus responds to the man's physical/social condition as well.
There is a challenge, however, in the incident. If leprosy could be more than Hansen's Disease, and result in physical and social isolation, can we see such a thing in our own day? Oh yes! Sometimes, by our own ecclesiastical efforts to be faithful, we create "lepers" who feel excluded, even though they may believe - e.g. the divorced/remarried, the LGBTQ folks - basically all the people that Pope Francis is urging us to reach out to. The response by some would be the protest that such healing will overwhelm, as Mark indicates. Jesus couldn't get out in public without a crowd gathering. Jesus' "stern warning" had no effect because there was no containing his own mercy!! Can such a thing be said of the Catholic "Body of Christ?" It's a serious question that deserves a serious response! AMEN