Preached September 8/9 at Blessed Kateri Parish, St. Cecilia site:

(Isaiah 50:4c-9a, Jas 2:14-18, Mark 8:27-35)

People don’t seem to like to talk these days.  My kids prefer to text or tweet or communicate on facebook rather than to actually have a conversation.  They look at my cell phone which doesn’t do a whole lot more than make phone calls, and they look at me like I’m some kind of dinosaur.  Fact is, more and more of our communication these days is visual.  Books, magazines, computers, i-phones, twitter, facebook, the vision in television – it’s all visual communication.

            Well that wasn’t so in the day of Our Lord, back when our Gospel story took place.  So let’s wander back in our 2000 year time machine and imagine for a moment that we are right there, in the crowd in the region of the Decapolis.  We’ve heard all about this miracle worker, Jesus, and we’re very interested in finding out if all we’ve heard about Him is true.  We know the words of Isaiah, promising one to come who would open the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf, and make the mute sing!  Is this the one?  And now we see Him walk off with the deaf mute.  This poor guy – he can’t hear anything and can barely say a word.  It’s a huge disability, for we’re living in a time when nearly all communication is verbal, through hearing.  Almost nobody in the crowd with us can read, and there’s almost nothing to read – we have scrolls and primitive books, but they must be transcribed by hand, after all.  News and knowledge - all passed by word of mouth.

            Now imagine you are that deaf man.  In a culture that relies almost exclusively on verbal communication, you’re pretty much cut off, even from the people around you.  You can’t know what’s going on.  You probably have very little communication with anyone, outside of simple hand gestures.  And your deafness has basically left you unable to speak.  You are, in a word, imprisoned – imprisoned in your own world, unable to fully participate in the world around you, the culture of your day.

            You need a healing, to be sure.  And Jesus, responding to the begging crowd of gentiles, invites you aside, one on one.  He does something very strange for that day and age – he touches you.  People just aren’t accustomed to touching much, not even among family members.  But this Jesus, He puts his fingers in your ears.  A real act of intimacy,   Then he does something not strange to you at all – he spits and touches your tongue – for spittle was often employed in healing.  He groans and looks up to heaven and cries out “Ephphatha” – be opened!  And you are healed.  Perhaps for the first time in your life, you can hear.  And suddenly you can speak clearly.  Most importantly, you are set free – free to interact, to be in community, to be in relationship.  No longer locked up in your own silent world.

            Now let’s get back in our time machine and fast forward 2000 years to this evening/morning. 

            Now you and I are not deaf or mute, but I am willing to wager that each one of us here tonight/this morning is in need of some sort of healing today. 

            It might be a relationship that needs healing.  Perhaps you’re far away from someone who should be close to you.  In your marriage. Perhaps with your children.  Siblings.  Parents perhaps.  My own mother, a wonderful Catholic woman, was estranged from her own sister for the better part of thirty years.  It wasn’t something she talked about, and certainly wasn’t proud of.  Praise God there was some healing and relationship rebuilding there before my mom died.  I’ve had some relationship problems with my own adult kids, relationships that I frankly botched, that I pushed dangerously close to the breaking point, relationships that desperately needed healing.

            Or it might be an attitude that needs healing.  Often times I can have a quite prideful attitude.  It’s all about me – my wife is often dismayed when she tries to tell me something and somehow I respond and twist it around and make it about me.  It could be an attitude of arrogance, or possibly inferiority.  It could be a grudge we’re holding onto, or forgiveness that we refuse to beg for, or are reluctant to give.

            Or it might be a habit or an addiction.  An addiction perhaps to drugs or alcohol, or pornography, or an addiction to a particular person, or maybe to video games or the internet, or to gossip.  Or maybe it’s a bad habit like smoking or overeating. 

            We need healing for these things because like the deafness in the Gospel, it is imprisoning us, keeping us locked up within ourselves, keeping us focused selfishly, inwardly on ourselves, keeping us from being in full relationship with others, and from being all that we’re called to be.

            Whatever it is in your life, in my life, in each one of our lives, that needs healing, that needs redeeming, the good news of today’s Gospel is that we don’t need a time machine and we don’t need to imagine to bring that to the Lord for healing.  If we have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, if we humbly bring that to the Lord and beg Him to heal us, if we admit that we are powerless without His mercy and grace, He will take us away from the crowd, touch us, and heal us. 

            We need to believe He can do it.  We need to trust that He wants to do it.  Our Lord wants nothing more than to heal us.  He came into the world to save us and make us whole. 

            We Catholics are blessed indeed for we have a special place, a special Sacrament in which we encounter the Lord and experience His extravagant mercy.  Yes, it’s the Sacrament of Reconciliation.  It’s where we can tangibly experience the healing presence, the healing touch of Our Blessed Lord, where we can hear the words of forgiveness, where He sets us free, and we can truly “go in peace,” unburdened from all within us that needed healing, strengthened to go forth to do His will.

            And we are blessed indeed to be invited to the altar, to receive His sacred body and precious blood, to be restored to wholeness and communion, and go forth to live Eucharistic, thankful lives.

            As we go through our day this weekend/today , and all this week, let us reflect on what it is in our lives that needs the Lord’s healing, that only Christ can restore and make whole.  What is it that is keeping you, keeping me, from being all that we’re called to be?  Let us humbly bring this brokenness to Jesus, Jesus who longs to heal us, Jesus who is Lord forever and ever.  Amen.