Homily for the Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
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Today we hear a story-within-a-story in which Saint Mark provides us with curious little details. The stories reverberate with one another because suffering and death belong to one another within the deeper mysteries of our humanity.
Our physical, earthly life is surrounded by our spiritual, eternal life, just as our story of the woman is surrounded by the story of the girl. Suffering and death are part of life, but they don’t define life. Therefore, Jesus took on human suffering and death, redeeming and sanctifying them, infusing them with meaning in the eternal scope of things.
He did this to show us that knowledge of life beyond this life begets the deepest longing of our souls, even when we’re consumed with real suffering or facing the ultimate human reality of death. So, in Christian Charity, though lacking in miraculous power, we work to alleviate suffering and to prepare the Dying to meet this threshold by caring for one another with empathy and compassion.
But there’s more to the story than this!
The Author of the Book of Wisdom, speaking of our hope for eternal life, wrote “God did not make death, nor does He rejoice in the destruction of the living.” This means that while we are created as mortal Beings, (Original Sin having introduced death to humanity) we are destined for immortality, as he says further, “God made Man to be imperishable, in the image of His own nature God made him.”
The sad reality of sin deforms the image of God within us into the likeness of death which God did not create. But just as God’s mercy is more powerful than sin, so is His life-giving love more powerful than death. We should keep this in mind when we are suffering in any manner, or if the specter of death and dying is looming over us.
So, if you are experiencing any anxiety due to the suffering in your life, be it physical, emotional or spiritual, stay close enough to Jesus that you can touch Him, as did the woman in our Gospel story, and that you can hear Him say, “Do not be afraid, your faith has saved you.”