Parish Missions

A Season for Anything but the Ordinary

This season of the Church Year which we call "Ordinary" calls us to reflect and act upon the concrete everyday ways we can build the New Creation that Christ came to establish through his death and resurrection. Today we are given a powerful challenge to get personally involved with healing and the giving of life.

The Book of Wisdom establishes the principle that God wills life. Life and wholeness were always a part of God's plan for creation. If there is death and brokenness it is not what God intended: they exist because of our fallen natures. Humankind chose to be in control, so death and brokenness come with the territory. But that's not the way it's supposed to be.

Paul tells us in his letter to the Corinthians that it is in Jesus' image that we should bring equality into the world. Not that we become less than those in need, but that we simply even things out. If there is to be the fulfillment of a New Creation equality and equity are the keystones of that vision.

It is in the Gospel that we learn how we are to bring this about. Jesus is shown as one who advocates for life and for quality of life. In both situations in today's Gospel it is to women that he extends his power: women who were less than second class citizens in Jesus' time. The woman with the bleeding problem was cursed: she was unclean, rejected and alone, marginalized by her religion and her community. She had to slink up behind Jesus to touch his garment. The healing in this case shows Jesus as instinctively advocating a quality of life.

In the other scenario we are told that once the little girl has died, there was no need to bother the master. But any vision of a New Creation calls for the conquering of death. The people had accepted the reality of the child’s death, but Jesus wanted to give testimony to the power of his vision for a new world order. Through a compassion that is equally within our ability, Jesus responds to the needs of others and makes visible his vision of what will be. Death is only a transition.

Life and wholeness are precious to Jesus and that's the message he conveys with these miracles. In both cases Jesus violated the conventions of the day. He touched them. He became personally involved with their struggle! The woman afflicted with menstrual bleeding and the dead child were both unclean; ritual purity prohibited touching them. Touch passed on the impurity! But Jesus allows the one to touch him and calls her act an act of faith; the other he reaches out and touches, calling her by the affectionate term "little one."

Jesus is telling us to touch with the touch of love and compassion those who are broken and lifeless. He's telling us to get involved even if it means going against established conventions; even if it means personal risks and sacrifices. For the principle of the Book of Wisdom that God wills life and Paul's admonition to strive for equality need to be taken out of the realm of pious platitudes and into the realm of building the New Creation.

It was in the early 1990’s when Debbie and Bill found out

that their son Dennis had AIDS, he was already dying. They

brought him home to Lorain where they cared for him and where

their Faith Community of Sacred Heart Chapel would be a major

support during this difficult time. His eventual death surrounded

by loving family and friends inspired Debbie and Bill to become

two of the most active AIDS advocates in Northeastern Ohio.

Though some people at the time found it hard to see why

they would publicly acknowledge their son's lifestyle and cause

of death, Debbie and Bill found that their faith called them to

embrace the call to wholeness and life by serving the needs

of those living with AIDS and those who love and care for them.

It was through Bill and Debbie's efforts that saw eventual

establishment a corps of 72 HIV-Friendly Clergy in Lorain

County and they were also instrumental in creating over 14

HIV-Friendly Congregations in that County. Why did they do

this? "We want others to know what it's like to die surrounded

by love."

*********

When Pat died something of Elaine died. Family and friends

began to worry about her.

Then one day Elaine saw an article in the Cleveland Plain

Dealer which told of the creation of Malachi House, a project of

the people of St. Malachi Church on Cleveland’s near west side.

The four row houses that someone had given to the church were

being gutted and remodeled to become a home for the inner city’s

dying poor who were alone and unwanted.

Elaine volunteer the next day. “I didn’t suffer all that for just

Pat and me,” she told a friend. She, too, wanted others to feel

what it was like to die surrounded by love.

In the face of brokenness and death God wills life, and we, in imitation of Jesus, are being called today to empty ourselves in seeking in this "Ordinary Time" extraordinary ways to bring the healing touch of wholeness and life into our broken world. Being pro-life is a broader concept than we sometimes are willing to admit.