Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 5—December 2,1976
r >
What Was
Jesus’ Mission?
BY FATHER JOHN J. CASTELOT
One of the most engaging titles given to Jesus
by Christian tradition is “Divine Physician.”
Even a superficial reading of the Gospels reveals
how justified this title is. On almost every page
we see Jesus healing ills of all kinds. This
particular activity was an essential part of His
messianic mission.
When John sent some of his disciples to
Jesus, they said: “John the Baptizer sends us to
you with this question: ‘Are you “He who is to
come” or do we look for someone else’?” (At
that time He was curing many of their diseases,
afflictions, and evil spirits; He also restored
sight to many who were blind.) Jesus gave this
response: “Go and report to John what you
have seen and heard. The blind recover their
sight, cripples walk, lepers are cured, the deaf
hear, dead men are raised to life, and the poor
have the good news preached to them” (Lk.
7,20-22).
Jesus’ reply alluded clearly to Is. 35,5-6, part
of a poetic description of the return from the
Babylonian Exile in terms reminiscent of the
Exodus from Egypt. The New Testament, in its
turn, interpreted the Christ-event as the
ultimate, definitive Exodus from sin to
salvation. And so Jesus could point to His work
of healing as a sign that the messianic age had
dawned, that He was “He who is to come.”
Jesus’ miracles must be kept in proper
perspective. In an age not long past they were
often presented as “proofs” of His divinity, as
if divinity were something that could be
demonstrated by a chain of reasoning! Used in
this way, their intimate relation to Jesus’
mission was perceived only dimly, if at all. That
mission involved inaugurating of the reign of
God. This, in turn, called for overthrowing the
reign of evil, personified by Satan. That is why
there is frequent mention of Jesus’ casting out
of demons. Those assaults on the forces of evil
were not all exorcisms in the technical sense;
real diabolical possession is a rare phenomenon.
In the popular mind, however, there was a
close tie-up between demonic actions and all
ills; physical, psychic, cosmic. Consequently
every cure, every demonstration of power over
nature’s destructive forces pointed to Jesus’
messianic victory over the forces of evil. And
this was His mission. His cures were not
something extrinsic to that mission, signs
pointing to its va!idity" 'a!though within limits
they can be so used.
The arch-enemy of God’s reign in people’s
hearts is sin; this is the enemy He came to
conquer. In Matthew’s story of the Jesus’ birth,
the angel tells Joseph, “She is to have a son and
you are to name him Jesus because he will save
his people from their sins” (Mt. 1,21). His very
name spells out His life’s purpose: victory over
sin. Of course He did not cure every afflicted
person in Galilee during His ministry there. Had
the healing of physical and emotional ills been
His ultimate purpose, this would pose a
problem. But through His cures and over and
above them, He was aiming at the real evil: sin.
One particular miracle brings this out
clearly: the cure of the paralytic whose friends
let him down through an opening in the roof
into the presence of Jesus. What they wanted
was unmistakably clear. But before He granted
their unspoken request, He said to the
paralytic: “My son, your sins are forgiven”
(Mk. 2,5). This went to the heart of the matter;
the physical cure which followed was
secondary.
This does not mean that Jesus was
indifferent to human suffering as such, that He
used illnesses simply as opportunities to
demonstrate and effect His victory over sin.
The Gospels eloquently testify to His deep
sympathy and concern. The plight of the
afflicted moved Him deeply. In Mark’s account
of a leper’s cure, we read: “Moved with pity,
Jesus stretched out his hand, touched him,
and said: ‘I do will it. Be cured’ ” (Mk. 1,41).
Interestingly, many ancient manuscripts read
“Moved with anger!” Who among us has not
experienced a frustration bordering close upon
anger at seeing horrible suffering?
In addition to many accounts of individual
miracles, the Gospels give impressive little
summaries, i.e., “As evening drew on, they
brought him many who were possessed. He
expelled the spirits by a simple command and
cured all who were afflicted, . . .” (Mt. 8,16; see
12,16; Mk. 6,53-56).
In the Acts of the Apostles, Luke parallels
these summaries with references to the apostles’
healing activity (5,15-16). Finally, James’ letter
indicates that this same concern for the sick
continued in the Church. Notice, too, the
double preoccupation with physical illness and
the sickness of sin: “Is there anyone sick among
you? He should ask for the presbyters of the
church. They in turn are to pray over him,
anointing him with oil in the Name (of the
Lord). This prayer uttered in faith will reclaim
the one who is ill, and the Lord will restore him
to health. If he has committed any sins,
forgiveness will be his” (Jas. 5,14-15).
N
Healing: What Is It?
L
BY FATHER ALFRED MCBRIDE, O. PRAEM.
Some of the happiest faces you will ever see
are on people coming home from the hospital
or rising from a sick bed. Along with a birth
and a wedding, the best news we can hear is
that a beloved friend or relative is well again.
Healing is always good news. So wonderful an
experience is it that the healed one will jump
for joy - as in the case of the lame man in Acts.
“And leaping, he stood and walked, and
entered the temple with them, leaping and
praising God.” Acts 3,8.
The gift of healing is tirelessly reported in
the New Testament. Isaiah foretold that healing
would be a sign of the messianic times. (Is.
35,5-6) While the term healing is usually
reserved for the cure of the sick body, the
deepest healing is the cure of the sick soul.
Salvation and redemption are the supreme
forms of healing. Hence the sacraments -
especially those of Baptism, Eucharist, Penance
and anointing - are regular events of healing for
all people who believe.
Still, this broader and deeper notion of
healing does not exclude the necessity of
looking at the healing of physical ills by the gift
of the Spirit. This gift of healing seems to have
been more commonplace in New Testament
times. ,In subsequent times, the gift was
narrowed to lives of the saints, shrines such as
Lourdes and the practice among some
Protestants known as “faith healing.”
In recent history, the growth of the scientific
mind, coupled with the marvelous advance of
medicine had moved the possibility of a
spiritual gift of healing to the margin of
KNOW
YOUR
FAITH
(All Articles On This Page
Copyrighted 1976 by N.C. News Service!
- ■
Christian practice. Some began to view the old
healing stories as myth, or else psychosomatic
cures that possessed no particular spiritual
origin. If biblical people claimed there was
some connection between sin and sickness,
contemporary people countered that there was
a link between one’s psychic health and
physical well being.
In addition we all know the bizarre stories of
some people who refused common sense
medical care and instead relied upon a miracle
cure to handle the illness, with the tragic results
of death in some cases (as in appendicitis). The
growth of the charismatic renewal, with its
testimonies about healing, raises the questions
again for our time.
Biblical writers testified to the possibility of
a gift of healing coming from the Holy Spirit.
They do not reject the possibility of healing by
certified doctors, nor do they establish any
principle that would exclude psychiatric help -
had they known of it. The biblical record
simply reserves the possibility of healing
through the power of the Spirit as one of the
approaches to a compassionate treatment of the
sick.
Hence the attitude toward healing should be
broad enough to include all people who have a
clinical interest in helping the sick to get well.
Put perhaps in an oversimplified way, there
should be a healing community in which body
doctors, mind doctors and “soul doctors” could
work together for the total good of the patient.
The goal after all is the full health of the
person -- bodily, psychic and spiritual.
The Church has always held to the possibility
of cures resulting from spiritual means. To this
day, three miracles are required for the
canonization of the saints. At the same time,
the Church remains every bit as skeptical as any
scientist about a given cure until it seems
demonstrably to be of divine origin. Anyone
who has read the critical approaches of a Devil’s
Advocate in canonization procedures, or the
strict evaluation procedures of the Church
authorities at Lourdes is well aware that the
Church does not advocate a naive view of
miracle cures.
What is unfair and unwarranted is the
assumption that such a cure can’t happen. It is
one thing to deny the possibility and quite
another to admit the possibility while taking a
long, prudent and critical look at the matter.
Yes, healing comes in many forms and from
many sources. Let us praise God that such
Good News - Gospel is still all around us.
VICTORY OVER EVIL - Father John J. Castelot writes,
“Every cure, every demonstration of power of the destructive
forces of nature pointed to Jesus’ messanic victory over the
forces of evil. And this was precisely His mission. The
arch-enemy of the reign of God in people’s hearts is sin.” In the
new rite of Reconciliation, sins can be discussed on a
face-to-face basis as in this demonstration by Father Louis
Hohman and Christine Hamm of Churchville, N.Y. (NC Photo
by Susan McKinney)
' \
Absolution: A Magic Eraser?
s ,
BY FATHER JOHN A. GEIGER
When is our healing complete?
Although Jesus healed many people of
physical ailment, He was very careful to teach
that this was not the main reason why He came.
The evangelists were also careful to call those
miracles “signs,” especially of the forgiveness of
sins and of the healing it leads to.
This, of course, smacks us with the question:
A wound obviously isn’t healed if it’s still
festering or sore. It isn’t even healed completely
when the scab falls off.
Last week a lady told me that her daughter,
who had broken her leg, was still limping after
the cast was off because she had not yet
regained confidence.
PUBLIC PENANCE at one time was
prescribed for sins that were known
publicly, Father John A. Geiger writes.
The classic example, as depicted in this
painting by Ambrogio Borgognone, was
St. Ambrose’s command that Roman
emperor Theodosius dress in. a sack
cloth and beg for prayers at the
entrance of the Cathedral in Milan
because of injustices to the citizens.
The emperor complied because he
knew the need for complete healing.
(NC Photo)
So, although we would like to hope for
instant healing, most wounds simply don’t and
won’t heal fast.
When we attempt to translate this into
spiritual need, I’m afraid we are prone to forget
the axiom: Grace doesn’t destroy or contradict
nature, but completes it.
The penchant to draw a strict line of
distinction between nature and supernature has
caused terrible confusion.
And speaking of supernature, I wonder when
Kellogg’s will finally send the four Superman
records I ordered with three “Pep” boxtops and
$4.75.
The myth of a man changing instantly from
weak Clark Kent into a powerful being is
intriguing to us. And isn’t it interesting that he
always does it privately before the effect
becomes public?
Is there an analogy here?
A number of years ago a man I was
instructing complained that whenever he and
his wife had a spat, she’d trek off to confession
for the peace of forgiveness and leave him
hanging. What had happened to the public
effect of that private transformation? Or was
the transformation real for her? The healing
obviously wasn’t complete. Why?
I think the trouble rises from our attempt to
think of absolution as a magic eraser. It isn’t.
The application of the medicine, the clean
bandage or the cast - confidence in faith that
God forgives us as soon as we’re open to receive
Him - certainly are instant. But what about
continuing soreness and that scab? And what
about regaining confidence to walk without
limping?
Do we divide our lives into two
compartments - one for private peace with our
God and the other for our public wars? That’s
insane. How in the world can we say, “Forgive
us our sins as we forgive those who sin against
us,” without blushing if we use our sacraments
that way?
Contrary to popular assumption, the Church
has never promoted public confession for
private sins. But complete healing even for
private offenses requires at least enough
publicity for real reconciliation.
Public Penance in an earlier age was
prescribed for sins that were known publicly.
The classic example was St. Ambrose’s
command that the Roman emperor - was it
Theodosius? - dress in sack cloth and beg for
prayers at the entrance of the Cathedral in
Milan because of injustice to the citizens of
Thessalonica. The emperor did it because he
knew the need for complete healing.
Too bad there wasn’t an Ambrose around
during the Watergate fracas.
And what about our own squabbles? What
parish doesn’t have them?
Public celebration of God’s mercy and its
power to heal us completely makes grand sense.
Let’s not resist the movement of the Spirit in
the fantastic reforms of our day. They’re
rooted in almost 2,000 years of practical
experience.