Many years ago a young Catholic priest
from Mexico developed a very serious heart condition. Pace
makers were something quite new and the technology was not as developed as it
is now.
After receiving his first pace maker,
Father was subject to other surgeries which were required to maintain the pace
maker or to replace it all together.
Despite the profound discomfort endured
throughout the different surgeries, the priest always refused any pain
medication when he awoke from surgery.
Instead, he would put on his bathrobe and go from room to room, visiting
as many patients as he could.
This Sunday’s Gospel passage gives us a
glimpse into the compassion of God. God
is not distant. He is not a stranger to us. Our compassionate God is made visible to us
in Jesus Christ.
“A
leper came to Jesus and kneeling down begged him and said, ‘If you wish, you
can make me clean.’ Moved with pity, he
stretched out his hand, touched him, and said to him, ‘I do will it. Be made clean.’ The leprosy left him immediately, and he was
made clean” (Mark
1: 40-42).
The words moved with pity appear throughout the gospels and they help us to
understand the compassion of the Lord. Moved with pity expresses a movement of
the heart much more profound than simply a feeling
sorry for someone. Instead, what is
being expressed here, is a movement of the heart that goes to the very depths
of one’s being.
“When Jesus was moved to compassion, the
source of all life trembled, the ground of all love burst open, and the abyss
of God’s immense, inexhaustible, and unfathomable tenderness revealed itself”
(Henri Nouwen, Compassion, page
15).
Jesus raises from the dead the only son
of the widow of Nain because of this profound movement of his heart (Luke 7:
11-17). The Good Samaritan stops and
takes care of a man in need because he was moved
with compassion (Luke 10: 29-37). This
same movement of the heart drives the father to run toward his returning
prodigal son, embracing and kissing him (Luke 15: 11-32).
“As soon as we call God, ‘God-with-us,’
we enter into a new relationship of intimacy.
By calling God Immanuel, we recognize God’s commitment to live in
solidarity with us, to share our joys and pains, to defend and protect us, and
to suffer all of life with us. The
God-with-us is a close God, a God whom we call our refuge, our stronghold, our
wisdom, and even, more intimately, our helper, our shepherd, our love. We will never really know God as a
compassionate God if we do not understand with our heart and mind that ‘the
Word became flesh and lived among us’” (Henri Nouwen, Compassion, page 13).
This is why we need to meditate over and
over again on the mystery of the Incarnation until all of its consequences
penetrate our entire being.
We must be convinced, existentially,
that Jesus is real and that I can have a personal relationship with him.
As Saint Augustine so beautifully
affirms, “To fall in love with God is
the greatest of all romances; to seek him, the greatest adventure; to find him,
the greatest human achievement.”
When Jesus is
just as real to us as he was to the leper that he cured, our frustrations,
discouragements, fears and loneliness will vanish. We are never alone, because our God is a God
of unconditional compassion. Our God is
a God who is always with us.
The compassion
of Jesus calls us to live our lives in the same way.
Something in
our modern society is causing us to be broken and separated from one
another. Neighborhoods filled with
cheerful children playing in the streets have been replaced by the silence of
isolation. Perhaps the on-going exposure
to every crisis in the world has caused many to become numb and angry. “Massive exposure to human misery often leads
to psychic numbness” (Henri
Nouwen, Compassion, page 51).
Community is the answer. Left alone, modern man remains
powerless. Wherever the Christian
community is formed and developed, compassion should be the result.
“Jesus Christ is and remains the most
radical manifestation of God’s compassion” (Henri Nouwen, Compassion, page 50).
Throughout the history of the Church,
visible reminders are given to us in the lives of the saints who strove to
imitate the Lord within the daily circumstances of their practical existence.
Contemporary man is moved more by witness
than by argumentation. Such is the case
of Mikhail Gorbachev who made a private visit to Assisi in order to pray at the
tomb of Saint Francis. According to a
March 19, 2008 article in The Telegraph, Gorbachev said, "St Francis is, for me, the alter Christus, the other
Christ. His story fascinates me and has
played a fundamental role in my life.”
"It was through St Francis that I arrived at the Church, so it was
important that I came to visit his tomb.
I feel very emotional to be here at such an important place not only for
the Catholic faith, but for all humanity."
Both Jesus and Francis embraced a man afflicted with leprosy. Perhaps we will never have an opportunity to
do the same thing.
Nevertheless, we are surrounded with people with all sorts of needs. Our family members, our co-workers, our
friends at school, our neighbors and our parishioners; these are the people that
are in need and these are the people that need our compassion each and every
day.
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