This fourth Sunday of Lent we celebrate the second of the three Scrutinies for our Elect, the second of three opportunities for us to pray over – and for – those who are preparing to be baptized at Easter. When we consider the readings for today, it’s important to note that the readings for the Scrutinies – indeed, for all of Lent – are selected to build upon one another.
Each Lent, no matter which cycle of readings we’re on, the 1st and 2nd Sundays give us the temptation of Christ in the desert to emphasize Jesus’ humanity, and then the Transfiguration to emphasize his divinity. When we celebrate the Scrutinies, we use the Year A readings from the Gospel of John for the 3rd, 4th, and 5th Sundays of Lent. In last week’s telling of the woman at the well, we see Christ revealed as the Living Water who renews and sustains us. In today’s Gospel, we see Christ as the Light of the World who illuminates and guides us. Next week in the raising of Lazarus, we will see Christ as the Resurrection and the Life who conquers all things, even death itself.
These Gospel readings gradually reveal to us the fullness of who Jesus is and invite us to live as followers of this Jesus Christ, true God and true man.
Last week, we heard the gradual awakening of Photina, the woman at the well, who went from addressing Jesus as a generic Jew, then as “sir,” then as a prophet, and finally having Jesus confirm the conviction welling up in her that he is indeed the Messiah, the one called Christ who is to come.
If Photina was going about her daily business only to find she had encountered the Messiah in person, how much more did today’s man born blind find his life utterly and definitively transformed by his encounter with a man he at first could not see, but who he listened to and from whom he gained his sight?
The man was sitting in his usual spot begging, listening – like he probably had to do every day – to people walking by and judging him, people without compassion whose only curiosity about him was whether it was his own sin or that of his parents that led to him being punished by God with blindness. But today, there was a different voice. A loving voice that proclaimed, “Neither he nor his parents sinned; it is so that the works of God might be made visible through him.”
There must have been something about that voice. I imagine that if I was blind and vulnerable, and suddenly felt someone smearing clay on my eyes, I would recoil and try to push them away. But with the words “neither he nor his parents sinned” still ringing in his ears – words that were lifting, even in a small way, the burden on his heart – he was willing to sit still for the gentle touch of this man he could not see and be willing to heed the man’s instruction to “Go wash in the Pool of Siloam.”
He accepted the discomfort of the clay, washed, and came back able to see. Can we do that?
In so many ways, aren’t we like Photina or the man born blind, going about our routine and just dealing with it, knowing we’re lacking something but accepting that this is the hand we’ve been dealt and trying to make the best of it? I get the water I need, even if I have to schlep it home under the blazing noonday sun. If I sit here long enough, I’ll get enough measly coins to buy a bit of food to keep me going until tomorrow. Lather, rinse, repeat.
But we know that we’re made for more. So much more. And we can find it when we have the audacity to approach that man sitting by the well and hear what he has to say. We can find it when we let our guard down and let him minister to us and tell us what to do next. For last week’s woman and this week’s man, those simple first steps of trust transformed the entirety of their lives. It can be so for each of us.
That’s what our Elect and our Candidates are witnessing to. They heard the voice, they felt the prompt, and they’re stepping forward in a very public way to commit to their journey and, very importantly, to bear witness to the man they encountered at the well, to the voice that told them they are an essential part of God’s plan.
In an important way, they’re showing – as we’re all called to show – that our relationship with God isn’t merely a comfy little “Ooh, I found Jesus” stay-at-home, I’m spiritual-not-religious exercise. It’s about bringing others to meet him, even if it stretches us.
Photina marched herself into that Samaritan town with reckless disregard of what those people thought of her so that she could bear witness to the Messiah – her encounter with him exploded any notion that it was a her & him thing. She had to tell everyone. And they responded to her witness and were fulfilled by their own encounters with Jesus.
Our young man today spends most of his time holding up the “what” of what happened to him for all to see, even if he hasn’t yet fully grasped the “who” of it. He just knows what happened in his life is awesome and must be from God, and he won’t back away from that. He bears witness to it even in the face of opposition from those who hold themselves holier than thou. It’s only after his faith gets him kicked out of the synagogue (and perhaps even ruptures his relationship with his parents) that he gets to see Jesus face to face. The losses he’s experienced count as nothing – his gains, both physical and spiritual, inform his words and actions from that point on: “I do believe, Lord,” and he worshiped him.
Jesus told the blind man to go wash in the Pool of Siloam, which the Gospel tells us means “sent,” or even “the one who was sent.” Another word for one who is sent is “apostle.” Jesus made the man born blind an apostle, just as he did the woman at the well. They were people who encountered the Lord and whose natural response was to proclaim him to others, to the world. That’s what we’re called to as well.
Jesus performed many healing miracles when the people in need of healing approached him in faith or their friends brought them to Jesus in faith. In other cases, Jesus simply saw and had pity on them. But in all those cases, Jesus spoke, he touched, he acted, and the healing was done.
Today is unique in that Jesus involved the man born blind in his own healing. Jesus moistened the dust to make the clay he placed on the man’s eyes, but that in and of itself did not complete the healing process – Jesus told the man that he had a role to play: “Go wash in the Pool of Siloam.” It was only after the man did that that he gained his sight.
Three and a half weeks ago, we all received an invitation to participate in our own healing like the man in today’s Gospel. Rather than having clay placed on our eyes, we received the dust of last year’s palms moistened with holy water on our foreheads.
For the man born blind, he went to the pool named for the One Sent to wash himself clean. For us, we’re always invited, but particularly in this penitential season of preparation, to take ourselves to the cleansing offered by the One Sent through the Sacrament of Confession.
We can tend to avoid Confession from a place of personal discomfort with the human vulnerability it involves. We excuse ourselves or talk ourselves out of it in so many ways and for so many reasons that seem compelling to us, but we can’t dispute that the Sacrament is there and waiting for us. It’s an offer of healing from Christ himself that needs nothing more to be accomplished than our participation in his grace.
I tell myself that to avoid the Sacrament of Confession would be like the man born blind being anointed with clay and sent forth, but not going to wash in the Pool of Siloam. In this Sacrament, if Jesus has provided us with the first step, why would we fail to take the second step that will complete the healing process, when it’s us who benefits from the healing?
The Jesus who offers us his mercy and forgiveness in the Sacrament of Confession is the same Jesus who gives the totality of himself to us – Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity – in the Eucharist. It is this Jesus who is True God and True Man, who is the Living Water, the Light of the World, the Resurrection and the Life, who offers us his healing, who offers us his mercy, who offers us his forgiveness, who offers us the entirety of his very essence.
He offers. Will I accept and do my part?
Image:”Confession / Spowiedź” (CC BY 2.0) by familynewsservice
Deacon Steve O’Neill was ordained for service to the Archdiocese of Washington in June 2013 and serves at St. Andrew Apostle in suburban Maryland. After four years in the Marine Corps and three years at the University of Maryland (where met Traci, now his wife of 30+ years, and earned a degree in English), he has worked as an analyst with the Federal government. Deacon Steve and Traci have two sons and two daughters and three grandchildren.
Popular Posts