Gospel
Mk
2: 1-12
When
Jesus
returned to Capernaum after some days, it became known that he was at
home. Many gathered together so that there was no longer room for them,
not even around the door, and he preached the word to them. They came
bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men. Unable to get near
Jesus because of the crowd, they opened up the roof above him. After
they had broken through, they let down the mat on which the paralytic
was lying. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic,
“Child, your sins are forgiven.” Now some of the scribes were sitting
there asking themselves, “Why does this man speak that way? He is
blaspheming. Who but God alone can forgive sins?” Jesus immediately
knew in his mind what they were thinking to themselves, so he
said, “Why are you thinking such things in your hearts? Which is
easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say,
‘Rise, pick up your mat and walk?’ But that you may know that the Son
of Man has authority to forgive sins on earth” —he said to the
paralytic, “I say to you, rise, pick up your mat, and go home.” He
rose, picked up his mat at once, and went away in the sight of
everyone. They were all astounded and glorified God, saying, “We have
never seen anything like this.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Last
night and this morning, as Deacon Ray
read the Gospel, I was
kind of taking a peek at a lot of your faces.
You are terribly serious people. I
don’t think we’re listening with our imaginations. You heard what
happened. Jesus came home and he was preaching in this
house, maybe his own house. The crowds
were so great that the house was filled.
In front of the house there were great crowds and here comes these four
guys carrying their buddy, who’s paralyzed on a stretcher or on a mat
of
some
sort. Goodness knows how far they
carried him. They probably dropped him
three or four times. They get to the
scene and they say, “Oh no. We can’t
even get close,” but that doesn’t stop
them. I guess they went around to the
back. I don’t know. I was guessing that this house, wasn't
very
high, maybe nine feet tall. Somehow, they got this guy on the
roof.
They got up on the roof with him and then
they disassembled the roof. Some versions
say, “They dug out the roof”. The roofs
of Palestinian homes had slats on them and then lattices, not unlike
some of
our adobe homes. They filled in the
lattice area with grass and mud. So, these men,
disassembled the roof and lowered this character down.
That’s
a pretty good
story. We need to listen with our imaginations, I guess,
when Jesus was in the house and
what was going on with the roof? Then the roof comes apart and
here comes this body.
I’m sure people helped them. So,
there’s our hero laying there and Jesus looking at him. What does Jesus
do? He looks on him with love. He sees his
sins and he says, “Your sins are forgiven.”
There is no reference that Jesus even realized he was paralyzed.
Jesus looked right into his soul and saw that
he was alienated from God and he loved him and he said "your sins are
forgiven
you."
I
want to talk about his
friends
though. I’d like to meet those guys. I want friends like
that. No doubt they took their friend to Jesus to
be healed and indeed they got more than they asked for. He was
healed, body and soul or soul and
body. They were good friends.
What
is a friend?
Webster tells us: a person whom one knows, likes, and trusts. A
person with whom one is allied in a
struggle or a cause, a comrade. That’s
the best Webster could do but friends are more than that, aren’t
they?
As a matter of fact, a friend is something that
almost defies definition. You know who
your friend is and it’s hard to describe what that means. One
thing it means is that you love that
person.
There’s
a saying, “that
friends don’t
let friends drive
drunk," and that’s true. A friend is
always concerned about his friends. He’s
concerned with the greatest good, life itself. If you’re a real
friend or if you have real friends, then you
confront
each other. You also affirm each other. You comfort each
other. You encourage each other. You pat your friend
on the back. But you also rebuke them.
I
golf with some guys and
if you make
a bad shot, they’ll
say, “That was the worst shot I’ve ever seen.
That was terrible," and they’re being honest. Especially when
they’re watching me. A friend has less concern with the judgment
his friend will have on him than with the well being of the
friend.
That’s the way Jesus treated his
friends. Ask Peter, when you see him in
heaven one day, if he knows what it is to be rebuked by a friend.
If
we love someone and if
they’re
our friend, we’re
naturally concerned about him or her, their physical and their
spiritual well
being. We’re not afraid to be honest
with them, right? However, how often
have we heard this, or maybe it’s unsaid but understood? “I was
afraid to say anything to him. I feared I might lose his
friendship.” Well, maybe you would, but if you are afraid
to speak, you aren’t a friend worth keeping, anyway. How about
this
one? “Well, who am I to judge?” More people, more cowardly
Christians, hide
behind that scriptural mandate than can be counted. How about the
other scriptural mandate?
“Speak the truth and love.” How about
the scripture, “If your brother sins against you, confront him.
If he doesn’t listen to you, get the
priest. If he doesn’t listen to you and
the priest, then treat him as you would a non-friend.” That’s
paraphrased.
St.
James says, “whoever
brings back
a sinner from the error
of his way, will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of
sins.” You know we can all judge sin and
its effects. You know what sin is and
what it does. If you don’t, then you need
a friend to tell you.
I
think there’s a way to
help our
friends without appearing
to be judgmental. People in sin
will be unhappy, you know what I mean?
They’re not happy when they’re in sin and they’re vulnerable.
They’re vulnerable not only to sin and its
effects but they’re vulnerable to friendship and God’s love. So,
show them warmth and interest and
concern. Pray for them and do penance
for them.
St.
John Chrysostom said,
“I can’t
believe in the salvation
of anyone who does not work for the salvation of his neighbor.”
But, of course, before we help our friends, we
need to take a good look at ourselves.
Do that this week. Look at
yourself. What do you see? What does Jesus see? If
that hole in the roof was open and you
were presented before Him, what would He see?
Sin
separates us from God,
from each
other, from ourselves. Jesus wants to end that separation to forgive us
and unite us to
Himself. To do that, we need to be
presented before him and that takes an initiative on our part and it
takes
courage. I think you know where I’m
heading again. Yesterday, I heard
confessions from 2:00 till 3:30. Five
people, five. Man, you are the most
sinless bunch I have ever experienced in my life.
How
often do you need to
go to
confession? I don’t know.
Some people can go to confession just once a year and they’re virtually
sinless. There are many, many people
like that. Now for me, at least once
every three months. Never mind, don’t
even think, it’s none of your business, and it’s no great scandal
anyway. But I mean, if I don’t go to confession about
every three months, then I start to nag myself, my conscience gets to
me, you
know what I mean? But many of you here
this morning, haven’t been to confession in ten years. You know
that. That’s not right.
I’m
not going to get into
my sermon
on confession. It’s a sacrament. It was instituted by
Christ. There is no question. The first thing he did when
he rose from the
dead is he breathed on his disciples and said, “Receive the Holy
Spirit; whose
sins you shall forgive they are forgiven; whose sins you shall hold
bound,
they’re held bound." There’s no question
that Christ gave us this gift of reconciliation. There’s no
question so “don’t go there." Go there (pointing at the
reconcilliation room).
I really encourage you. Father
Joshua will be with us the next couple of months and I’ll be
here.
We’ll meet the need; we’ll put extended
hours; we’ll do whatever it takes. I really
encourage you to use this beautiful sacrament.
You’ll never regret it. You’ll
just be so blessed and free and you won’t regret it.
I
was in
Medjugorje about
five years ago, six,
seven years ago and I went to confession.
I did a general confession for my whole life. I was a priest at
the time but I was nagged
by some stuff, you know? I went to see a
wonderful priest there and came out of the confession about twenty
minutes later
and it was like a new day. There was
honeysuckle all around the place. I
didn’t smell it on the way in but I smelled it on the way out. I
was just in a state of peace and happiness
for probably, at least three days. It’s a
great gift. Get cleaned up and bring
your friends there too, and challenge your friends. If you love
someone and you know they’re
doing wrong, then call them on it, call your family on it, your
brothers, your
sisters. They won’t hate you if you do
it right.
God
bless you.