OMELIE / Omelie EN

26/6/2016

26/03/2017 – 4th Sunday of Lent – Year A

26/03/2017 – 4th Sunday of Lent – Year A

Reading 1, First Samuel 16:1, 6-7, 10-13 * Psalm 22 * Reading 2, Ephesians 5:8-14 * Gospel, John 9:1-41

“You were darkness once”: Saint Paul is speaking to the Christians in Ephesus. This is the grim reality: without Jesus, we too have been, and still are, “darkness”. The expression “to be darkness” means to live in the darkness, in the uncertainty, fear, danger, solitude, in an anxiety that becomes anguish, if not desperation. This could also refer to the behaviour of someone who keeps everything hidden, even his own identity, or someone who is living a lie. We all know these situations, either because we lived through them or because we know somebody else who still does. “Now you are light in the Lord” the Apostle continues. Who has known Jesus and lives with Him is joyful like someone who finally managed to escape an endless tunnel. Jesus’ love, forgiveness and wisdom are the lamp that sheds light on the meaning of our life and of everything that happens to us. Jesus’ presence let us become aware of all the people around us, and it lets us understand if they are a gift to us or an obstacle, if we can trust them and entrust them with our life, or if – unfortunately – we have to distrust them and defend ourselves from them. When I consciously live with Jesus, I become strong and persevering, in a way that others find easy to trust in me, and I also become gentle and kind, in a way that I could even stand annoying people. It is our God the one who Makes us kind and trustworthy. Far from Him, you could even risk to take “part in the futile works of darkness” that “are shameful even to speak of”.

All the Readings of today tell us about this topic of darkness and light. Jesus does that through an amazing miracle: by chance, He sees a blind man. But He is also aware that His disciples are even more blind than that man, those disciples that see in that man’s suffering a sin to be punished. The disciples are the ones interrogating Him in order to understand who is to blame: the one who is born blind or his parents? Jesus understands that, first of all, His light has to enlighten their minds and their hearts, and that just a few words are not enough in this case, that they need a visible sign. A sign that will silence them and will make them think over His true identity: “as long as I am in the world I am the light of the world”.

The sign that Jesus perform is that of the doctors in His times: with spit and soil He makes some mud and with His fingers dipped in that mud He touches those eyes that cannot see. Then, He commands the blind man to wash himself in one of the pools of Jerusalem, the one called “of Siloam”. “Siloam” means “sent”, a name that is clearly referring to Him, Jesus, sent by God the Father in our dark world.

The water, with what that man washed himself in obedience to Jesus’ command, contributes to open his eyes. That water foreshadows that of the baptism. With the baptism we are enlightened, that is to say we receive that togetherness with our Lord that frees us from uncertainty, fears, anxieties, in one word from all the fruits of darkness. This incident helps us to understand our baptism. The blind man is healed by Jesus’ action, but he has also to obey Him. If he had not gone to the pool, he would not have been healed. Afterwards, in more than one occasion, he has to justify that recovery, and he has to endure insults and humiliations when he talks about Jesus with firmness and gratitude. Nobody wants to believe him. Everybody wants to know, but with this knowledge they intend to condemn Jesus and the man with Him. That man who is not blind any more like them, because he started to believe in our Lord. He has to stand against everybody: he is a believer now, and believers are persecuted by those who are still in the darkness. Not even his own parents support him when the Leaders of the community throw him out. To be rejected by the people who do not welcome Jesus is not a bad thing, instead it is the right time to be united to our Lord even more consciously and fruitfully. We cannot complain if we see Christians excluded from some circles: those are the occasions that are offered to them in which to become true witnesses. So, when we have to endure injustice, we do not lose heart: those are precious steps towards the Kingdom of Heaven.

Darkness or light? If we stay with God our Lord we are light: we can clearly see the path we are going down, and we can illuminate it for somebody else as well.

The Reading of David’s summon is also of help in understanding what extent our blindness can go to. Even Samuel, the famous prophet, with all his knowledge, cannot recognise the person that God has chosen to be the guide of His people. He has to listen to our Lord and obey Him. Men are always blind, because “they look at appearances”, while only “Yahweh looks at the heart”.

In these days we regain knowledge of our Baptism. We rejoice in Jesus’ light and we continue to obey Him, not only because of the danger to go back to the darkness, but above all to be witnesses of the beauty of His love and of His wisdom, witnessing that He is true Life and the Truth that gives life.