Jesus Christ: Healing our body and soul!

Today is the 5th Sunday in Ordinary Time and today's Gospel reading is in the Gospel of Mark 1:29-39.

29 On leaving the synagogue [Jesus] entered the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John. 30 Simon's mother-in-law lay sick with a fever. They immediately told him about her. 31 He approached, grasped her hand, and helped her up. Then the fever left her and she waited on them.

32 When it was evening, after the sunset, they brought to him all who were ill or possessed by demons. 33 The whole town was gathered at the door. 34 He cured many who were sick with various diseases, and he drove out many demons, not permitting them to speak because they knew him.

35 Rising very early before dawn, he left and went off to a deserted place, where he prayed. 36 Simon and those who were with him pursued him 37 and on finding him said, "everyone is looking for you." 38 He told them, "Let us go on to the nearby villages that I may preach there also. For this purpose have I come." So he went into their synagogues, preaching and driving out demons throughout the whole of Galilee.

Remember the praise song that goes, "You are the God that healeth me, You the Lord my Healer"? That our Lord Jesus Christ is our healer is written by all the evangelists and repeated in the mouths of bishops, priests, shepherds and pastors. Stories that Jesus healed the blind and the sick and that woman with hemorrhage and even raised the dead are all true and as Jesus himself said, "Let us go on to the nearby villages that I may preach there also. For this purpose have I come."

This Gospel explains the reason why God sent his only son to do the ultimate act of humility and become one amongst us so he could heal us of our afflictions, both physical and spiritual. Today, whenever we are sick, we go to a botica to buy medicine or visit a doctor or a nearby hospital and find out what's wrong with us.

In ancient times, when they got sick they really had nowhere to go but lie in bed at home. A slight fever today is nothing to us, but in ancient times, a slight fever could be fatal because they didn't know what was causing the fever. This is why Jesus gave importance to the fever of the mother-in-law of Simon and cured her right away. After that, can you imagine the entire population of Capernaum crowding the doorway of the house of Simon Peter?

If you read this Gospel very carefully, you will also notice that the people in Jesus' time were not only afflicted with various ailments or diseases; many of them were possessed by demons, which our Lord Jesus also drove out from their bodies. Now this is something that we have not been hearing of today, but that should not mean that there are no more demons roaming the earth. I would like to believe that the evil demons are still with us today, except we don't have anyone exorcising them as often as they do. Of course, we have a few priests who specialize in exorcism rite, but this is considered a rare occurrence and not as rampant as physical sickness.

We can learn lessons from this Gospel story that if and when doctors fail in their effort to cure a patient, for all we know what could be ailing a particular patient could be a demon just waiting to be exorcised. No amount of medicine can work on a sick body for as long as a demon possesses it. As Jesus had shown with his miracles, whenever a demon leaves a human body, the body experiences serenity, calm and peace and returns back to a normal life.

The difference between human beings and animals is that, unlike animals, humans have not only flesh and blood but we also have a soul. So when our physical bodies goes hungry, we nourish ourselves with food and water. But how many of us take care and nourish our souls? Least you may have already forgotten, when a man loses his soul, he is for all intents and purposes dead! So you'd better nourish your spiritually hungry soul while you can and before it is too late in the hour. How? Go to confession, then go to mass and take Holy Communion that should nourish your soul.

Jesus can also heal a sick nation, like ours. Remember during the Jubilee Year when Jaime Rivera sang her popular song, "Father heal our land"? We all know that our government is also very sick sick of political greed, corruption, misuse of the poor for personal or political gain. We're sick of the apathy, cynicism and the sense of hopelessness. If we ask Jesus to heal our land I have no doubt that he will heal our country. But first we must know who is the Philippine government? Doesn't the authority of government come from the people? Indeed, so if we want our nation to be healed, then let's heal ourselves first!

* * *

For email responses to this article, write to [email protected].