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About The Georgia bulletin (Atlanta) 1963-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 14, 1989)
Page 2 • Faith Today Can youfind your twin in Scripture.? A doubting Thomas By Father John Castelot Catholic News Service T he Bible is full of ex amples of people at the end of their rope, certain that no one else ever had to face the kinds of problems they are confronting. They suffer, however, from a condition we all share — humanity. Sometimes the impression is created that biblical people are dif ferent, something other than human. They are important figures in salva tion history, after all. But they were flesh-and-blood people, flawed creatures just like us. It can be reassuring to recognize A special disciple By Father Eugene Laverdiere, SSS Catholic News Service W hat are you going to preach on tomorrow?” The question came from Nita, a Hawaiian woman of Samoan back ground. Nita knew a lot about ser mons. Her husband Andy is a deacon in the Diocese of Honolulu. Turning toward their son-in-law, I answered that my homily was going to be about a mother-in-law. The next day’s Gospel reading was the account from Mark in which Jesus heals Simon’s mother-in-law (1:29-31). Nita answered, “Say nice things.” And I did, introducing my homily with the little story I have just told. I could see Nita looking at me, a big smile on her face. I have given a lot of thought to Simon’s mother-in-law, the first woman mentioned in Mark’s Gospel. She lived at the home of Simon and Andrew. Her daughter was Simon’s wife, but is never mentioned. One day Simon’s mother-in-law was sick. When Jesus entered the home where she lay, he reached out to her and cured her. With her fever gone, she set about serving them. That is all we know about her. We do not even have her name. Reading that story, everyone can say, “Among the people in the Bible, she is some- this. It means we are not alone with our problems, that the people of Scripture are our brothers and sisters — perhaps our twins. The classic example of a doubter in Scripture was Thomas, a name that means “twin.” The fact is, he has had innumerable identical twins throughout history, people who have found it difficult to accept the challenge of faith. They want proof, and are tortured by their inability simply to believe. But faith does not come naturally or easily, especially in a scientific, technological age when anything that can’t be verified in a laboratory is suspect. So Thomas, who lived in another culture and time, still was one of us — our twin. Notice, however, that his story conveys more than the dubious con solation that we are not unique if we have difficulties with faith. It heartens us with the assurance that we can rise above those difficulties. one just like me.” Asked why, we might answer, “She seems like such an ordinary person, and among the healing stories in the New Testament, hers is so ordinary.” However, under every ordinary story, including ours, there is something extraordinary. In the ordinary story of Simon’s mother-in- law, I see some extraordinary things. First, the description of her cure. Our translations say he “approached, grasped her hand and helped her up.” That translation is a good rendering of the ordinary. But by looking up the original Greek word for “helped her up,” the extraordinary breaks through. In Greek we read that Jesus raised her up and the word used for “raised” is the same used in the Gospel to speak of Jesus' resurrection. People can be raised from death. But they also can be raised from ill ness, and this is like sharing in the resurrection from the dead. People in Bible times viewed death as the extreme illness. For them, ill ness was dying a little, or a lot. Another extraordinary thing I see comes at the end of her story. When the fever left Simon’s mother-in-law, “she waited on them.” Again translations do a good job in bringing out the ordinary. But looking up the original Greek word for “waited on them” we find the early Christian word for pastoral service. The same verb appears over and over to describe the ministry of those who saw to the good health and nourishment of the early church. That word has entered into our English language through the word “deacon.” Simon’s mother-in-law was not a deacon — Christian deacons had not For all his insistence on proof, when Thomas was offered tangible evidence — the opportunity to touch the wounds of Jesus — he did not avail himself of it. The presence of the risen Lord was quite enough for him to burst out with that extraordinary profession of faith, “My Lord and my God!” That still happens. People want assurance and God gives it — but often not in the way they had envi sioned. God enters their lives in unexpected ways, strange ways. They don't see or hear or touch him; they just know he is there. And they learn for themselves the truth of Jesus’ final remark to Thomas, “Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” The woman in Scripture who suf fered from a hemorrhage for 12 years must have thought she was cursed uniquely. But hope appeared on the scene with the coming of Jesus. Superstitiously, perhaps, she believed that if she just touched his cloak she would get better. She touched and was cured (Mark 5:29). Like Thomas, she has had many sisters and brothers throughout * history. So many people look upon religion as a sort of system of magic in which troubles vanish auto matically by performing certain acts. But Jesus’ treatment of the woman with the hemorrhage was revealing. He insisted on finding out who ? touched him. And when the poor, terrified woman revealed her identi ty, the necessary, missing ingredient was supplied: a personal relationship with Jesus. Religion is not magic. It is essen tially an ongoing personal relation- * ship with God. But it is one to which he invites everyone, even those who think no one ever has faced problems like theirs. (Father Castelot is a Scripture scholar, author and lecturer.) t rj—"—m Tm | /M / % Ml .ilf Ilf! ,/ jr \ u / yet been established — but she shared in the early Christian ministry. In fact, she is the first pastoral minis ter mentioned in the entire Gospel. She served in the home of Simon and Andrew, the nucleus of what was to be the early church. This indicates that her role was special. Simon’s mother-in-law certainly was person just like us. Her story is an in vitation to re-examine our own storigj (Father LaVerdiere is senior editot of Emmanuel.) ‘ CNS photo by Gene Plaisted A modern Martha By Jane Wolford Hughes Catholic News Service M ary of Bethany, sister of Martha and Lazarus, was not one of my favorite Scripture characters. I saw her as a pastel personality insulated from the reality swirling around her. w Now Martha — she with the bear ing of a lioness — I saw as a woman of reds and purples, responsive to life. There she was in her kitchen mixing the lentils and onions with olive oil, waiting on table at the home of Simon and setting out to fipd Jesus when Lazarus lay dead, while Mary sat home weeping. Both Mary, “who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak,” and Martha, “burdened with much serving, ’ ’ loved Jesus as the Messiah and as a friend. It was evident that he loved them and warmed to their hospitality. But when Martha came bustling with irritation from the kitchen to have Mary help her and leave the cir cle of those sitting at the feet of Jesus, he said: ^“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.... Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her” (Luke 1(5:41-42). Why? Were they not both serving him in their own way? When I was a young mother, the story’s lesson did not resonate in my own life, filled with babies, endless meals to prepare and small wedges of volunteer sendee. I was anxious and upset with many things which did not seem a matter of choice. The feisty Martha in me fejt this story was a put-down. But, as I pursued the Scriptures further, logic burned through some of my fog. Mary had to be unusual. JeSus had called her to be a disciple. She was privileged to sit at the feet of the teacher, among the men. Jesus consistently broke taboos about women’s roles and was trying to tell Martha of the better way open to her as well. *1 also was helped to discard my pale image of Mary when I con nected her in John’s Gospel (12:1-4) with the woman at the banquet who brought expensive perfume to pour over Jesus in a courageous testimony. We do not know her reactions to the disciples who felt money had been squandered on perfume that might better have been spent on the poor. She must have felt it well worth whatever her effort when Jesus said, “Wherever the good news is proclaimed throughout the world, what she has done will be told in her memory” (Mark 14:9). My Aunt Ruth helped reveal a greater portion of the mystery of this story to me. She was a spiritual jug gler sustained by divine grace and busy with many things. I suppose to some she seemed a typical Martha. She was a legendary teacher of English and public speak ing in the Detroit schools. When she died in her 80s, her classrooms were represented by students she had touched 30 years earlier. She taught catechism for 50 years. She knew how to delegate, for she was a leader who founded a Catholic library, the Sodality Union in Detroit and so many other organizations. She had chosen to remain single. It was the Mary side of her giving the extravagant gift of herself to uniquely serve her God. Even when exhaus tion crept in with age, she found new ways to serve. After daily Eucharist, she began her pilgrimages to the hospitals and nurs ing homes, and occasional funerals. She visited friend and stranger alike. She was an accepted, welcome, unofficial chaplain who brought the good news. Like Mary of Bethany, she will not be forgotten in our time. LJnlike mystery stories, the mysterious story of God is never totally revealed. But through the years I think I have isolated the lesson Jesus was giving about Martha, who was “anxious and worried about many things” and about Mary’s better way. It was a matter of priority: Jesus. That’s the priority my Aunt Ruth lived by all along. (Mrs. Hughes is a religious educator and free-lance writer.) FOOD FOR THOUGHT Sometimes it seems that the world of biblical times was so different from ours that its people must be quite unlike us as well. Yet, as our writers suggest this week, biblical people often are like their 20th-century counterparts in more ways than first meets the eye. ** Think of someone in the Bible whose feelings or dilemmas or goals you iden tify with. Who is the person? 'Second Helpings. In our relationship with Jesus, he asks the same ques tion that he asked his apostles, “Who do you say I am?” It is a difficult question to answer, suggests Salvatorian Father Andre Papineau in Lightly Goes the Good iNews: Making the Gospel Your Own Story. Because the question is demanding, “we may avoid answering it for years,” he says, for our answer may force us to live our lives differently. Father Papineau retells stories from the Bible and connects each story with people’s lives today. (Twenty-Third Publications, Box "180, Mystic, Conn. 06355. 1989. Paperback, $7.95.) Page 3 • Faith Today Elderly Care 24 Hr. Ser. 7 days wk. 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