Ordinary 5

Ordinary 5
by Paul O'Reilly, SJ

“He went all through Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and casting out devils.”

I think we’ve all had days when we felt like Job: “Is not man’s life on earth nothing more than pressed service, his time no better than hired drudgery? Like the slave, sighing for the shade, or the workman with no thought but his wages,… Remember that my life is but a breath, and that my eyes will never again see joy.”

Yes, there are some very evil places in this world. A few years ago, I was part of a group of 4 Jesuits who were sent to set up a new community in the heart of Moss Side in Manchester. This is a place which is famous for being the drug trafficking capital of the whole of the North of England. And it has the poverty, the lawlessness, the prostitution, the homelessness, the street-crime and the casual violence that goes along with drug trafficking all over the world. And when I was there children as young as 12 years old were shot in the street in wars between drug-dealing gangs.

We were given a disused flat in a largely abandoned and derelict block of flats. It was supposed to have been empty for years, but it had obviously been squatted in more recently by some drug addicts. Written on the wall under the title “My Life” were the saddest few lines I have ever read: “Heat the spoon, watch it melt, fill the syringe and stab yourself.” I never met whoever it was who wrote those words, but I have often prayed for her or him. Because those are the words of a true addict ­ a man or a woman whose life is dominated by an evil she or he cannot control ­ someone who feels compelled twice a day to do something to themselves that they know is desperately harmful and will, in all probability, one day cause them to kill themselves. Their entire life has become constricted to a little pool of liquid containing heroin and to those desperate acts of crime they have to carry out in order to get the money to buy themselves some more heroin. Job ­ like all of us at times - is overcome by that evil. But the Good News of today’s Gospel is that Jesus is not so overcome. There is something about his presence and his message that brings healing where-ever he goes. His healing frees people from the bodily and the spiritual diseases that afflict them. Throughout the towns and villages of Galilee ­ he preaches the Good News of God’s salvation and heals those who are sick. And we know that Jesus did not come only for the people of his own time. He came for the people of all times and of every place. The healing power of Jesus is present for us in the Church forever. He tells us: ‘I am with you always even to the end of time.’ (Mt 28;20). Of course, our first reaction to encountering serious evil ­ like those few lines of despair in Manchester - is to think that here we cannot be the followers of Christ. It’s an awful lot easier said than done. We alone cannot remove all the loneliness and fear; we cannot make a fever go away with a simple action, as Christ could. Yet, St Paul tells us, we have no choice ­ we have the responsibility whether we like it or not. All of us can say with him “it is a duty which has been laid on me”. Jesus has healed us, forgiving us our sins and reconciling us with God. He asks us now to bring his healing to others, to become humble, persevering and patient disciples, helping him to win others to repentance and holiness by our imitation of him in his compassion, generosity and service of all. As St Teresa says: “Christ has no body now but ours.” We are his eyes, his smile, his ears, and his hands, still mightily at work in the world. It is better to light one candle than to curse the dark! Let us stand and profess our Faith in Christ our Light.

Mount Street Jesuit Centre,
114 Mount Street,
London SW1K 3AH.
ENGLAND.
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