Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Our caution-money of the eternity
One of the synagogue officials, named Jairus, came forward ….and pleaded earnestly with him, saying, “My daughter is at the point of death. Please, come lay your hands on her that she may get well and live.” He went off with him, and a large crowd followed him and pressed upon him. There was a woman afflicted with hemorrhages for twelve years. She had suffered greatly ….She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak. She said, “If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured.” Immediately her flow of blood dried up …. Jesus, aware at once that power had gone out from him, turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who has touched my clothes?” But his disciples said to him, “You see how the crowd is pressing upon you, and yet you ask, ‘Who touched me?'” And he looked around to see who had done it. The woman, realizing what had happened to her, approached in fear and trembling. She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth. He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has saved you. Go in peace and be cured of your affliction.” While he was still speaking, people from the synagogue official’s house arrived and said, “Your daughter has died; why trouble the teacher any longer?” Disregarding the message that was reported, Jesus said to the synagogue official, “Do not be afraid; just have faith.” …. When they arrived at the house of the synagogue official, he caught sight of a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. So he went in and said to them, “Why this commotion and weeping? The child is not dead but asleep.” And they ridiculed him. …. He took the child by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum,” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise!” The girl, a child of twelve, arose immediately and walked around Mc 5,22-42
You can not imagine the light without the darkness, the health without the sickness, the wealth without the poverty, the joy without the pain and the life without the death, because the man, spending its life in a world in which the positive realities are always contrasted by their negation, cannot even to think of another world where there are only light, health, wellness, joy and life. All of us we ask, in front of the ills which afflict the humanity, what could be their meaning into the divine plan. In particular we feel disoriented in face of the innocent suffering, the pain of those who have not committed any fault, such as the young children. These are questions to which
we will find the response by one day, when we will move to the other side of our existence, like Jesus, in the today passage, goes to the other shore of the Tiberias lake. In fact, thinking about the miracles which happen in this page of the gospel, that switch to the other shore of the lake symbolizes our going, as the time passes, towards the eternity, where what is a miracle in this world, thereby is routine. For the moment we must be satisfied by the caution-money given in this reality of the kingdom of heaven and make an act of faith in the Lord, who won the largest negative reality of the existence: the death. This page of the today’s gospel is part of the advance which we receive in the meantime. The healing of the hemorrhage, who was sick for twelve years and the resurrection of Jairus’ daughter are the triumph of the life over the death, of the health over the sickness, of the joy over the pain and even of the light over the darkness, because these two miracles of Jesus illuminate the mystery in which we are immersed and propel us into the eternity of God, where everything is good and holy. It is a page of great hope, which we are called to contemplate, better than to seek theological meanings. I remember that my grandmother Rita in her last times, when it happened to stay sometime together, was often used to say: “I would like that on my tomb will be written: “I really wanted to rest”. I understand how, after so much struggling to overcome the difficulties of the life, she had a great desire to rest in God, where everything is clear, good, holy, joy and life. In the meantime, to be also prepared for that meeting, let us go behind the words which Jesus says to the ruler of the synagogue: “Do not fear, you have only faith”.