A friend wrote today about their discouragement at seeing so many family members being lax in the practice of the faith, even more, challenging everything about Jesus as is revealed in Sacred Scripture, Tradition, the teaching of the Church.
These are the times in which we live. For faithful Catholics a painful challenge, but one we share with Christ whose Heart aches for all of us. He is the Good Shepherd tirelessly looking for the strays.
The reality of non-believers in God’s redeeming love for us is there throughout the Old Testament, all the Gospel accounts, in the Acts of the Apostles, in the Epistles, in Revelation, yet each generation confronted with unbelief reacts as if this were a new phenomena.
When we pray daily, asking the Holy Spirit to increase and purify our own faith, hope, love, rather than bemoaning – perhaps even judging – the lack of faith others have, we should be crying out that they be gifted by the Holy Spirit, be found by Jesus and not wait to be picked up by Him, rather that they will leap into His arms in the joy of being found.
But the Jews did not believe concerning him, that he had been blind and received his sight until they called the parents of him who had received his sight. [v.18]
Some translations say ‘he gained his sight…..who had gained his sight’, which is misleading, for to ‘gain’ something implies one’s own effort, such as gaining a wage for working.
Received is more accurate as the man received the restoration of his sight by the miracle-gift Jesus gave him.
The refusal by those challenging Jesus to accept the testimony of the man himself and seeking out his parents is a blatant distortion of the instruction in Deut. 19:15 of seeking veracity through two or three witnesses: They asked them, “Is this your son, who you say was born blind? How does he now see?” [v.19] There is an obvious assumption that the parents were present for the miracle, which is certainly unlikely given their reply: His parents answered and said, “We know that this is our son and that he was born blind. We do not know how he sees now, nor do we know who opened his eyes. Ask him, he is of age; he can speak for himself.” [vs. 20,21]
The terror in the voices of the parents resounds throughout the millennia as a stark reminder, echo even as clear as when shouting in the mountains and our shout reverberates back to us, of how many of our brothers and sisters live under totalitarian regimes with secret police and neighbours who are government spies. Rather than judge these parents, or anyone living in powerlessness in countries without liberty, our hearts should hear clearly the parents words as a reminder to be grateful we live in free countries, to pray for the liberation of our brothers and sisters who do not, remembering too, in some countries, it is, as with the authorities challenging them here, ‘religious police’ who are most to be feared: His parents said this because they were afraid of the Jews, for the Jews had already agreed that if anyone acknowledged Him as the Messiah, he would be expelled from the synagogue. For this reason his parents said, “He is of age; question him.” [vs. 22,23]
Particularly since the enlightenment, become more relentless across the centuries to our own day, many persist in finding ways to denigrate the person of Our Beloved Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by either attacking Him directly, or His teachings, miracles or His Church, just as relentlessly as the Pharisees do here, so at this juncture not having Jesus before them to attack directly they go, once more, after the man Jesus had cured of blindness, while they stubbornly refuse to admit theirs is a deeper, darker, blindness: So a second time they called the man who had been blind and said to him, “Give God the glory! We know that this Man is a sinner.” [v.24]
We all know the experience of having a small child ask a question and then rather than accept the answer reply with “Why?” and once told why they invariably ask again, “Why?”, which is precisely the infantile approach the Pharisees are taking, but lacking the purity and simplicity of little children they are – insanely frankly – expecting a different answer to their repeated inquiries: He replied, “Whether He is a sinner or not, I do not know. One thing I do know is that I was blind and now I see.” So they said to him, “What did He do to you? How did He open your eyes?” [vs.25, 26]
The man’s reply is replete with truth and, given their repeated questioning, a purity of logic as clear as: since B follows A then clearly C must follow B: He answered them, “I told you already and you did not listen. Why do you want to hear it again? Do you want to become his disciples, too? [v27]
You can almost hear them spiting, sputtering their angry reply for this humble man has just sprung their trap upon themselves and they are furious: They ridiculed him and said, “You are His disciple; but we are disciples of Moses! We know that God spoke to Moses, but as for this fellow, we do not know where He is from.” [v.28,29]
Now something wonderful, even courageous occurs, as the man speaks with clarity, passion and conviction in a teaching mode rabbinical in its cadence: The man answered and said to them, “Why, this is a marvelous thing, that you do not know where He is from, yet He opened my eyes! Now we know that God does not listen to sinners, but if one is a worshipper of God and does His will, He hears him. Since the world began it is unheard of that anyone ever opened the eyes of a person born blind. If this Man were not from God, He would not be able to do anything.” [vs. 30-33]
This, as the saying goes, really put the cat among the pigeons, truly infuriated them, yet another indication their arrogance had them truly blind in heart and soul: They answered and said to him, “You were born totally in sin, and are you trying to teach us?” Then they threw him out. [v.34] Excommunicated from the synagogue for simply speaking truth. The action of the Pharisees showing a spiteful immaturity like a kid whose buddies won’t let him win the game, so he takes his hockey puck and heads off home.
Who really has been cast asunder and by whom?
© 2019 Fr. Arthur Joseph
