You are children of the Most High, all of you!

A reading from the gospel according to Mark (Mk 2, 1-12)

When [Jesus] returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that he was at home. So many gathered around that there was no longer room for them, not even in front of the door; and he was speaking the word to them. Then some people came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. And when they could not bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him; and after having dug through it, they let down the mat on which the paralytic lay. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” Now some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, “Why does this fellow speak in this way? It is blasphemy! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” At once Jesus perceived in his spirit that they were discussing these questions among themselves; and he said to them, “Why do you raise such questions in your hearts? Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and take your mat and walk’? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he said to the paralytic— “I say to you, stand up, take your mat and go to your home.” And he stood up, and immediately took the mat and went out before all of them; so that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”

This is the word of the Lord.

One short word, pronounced by Jesus in today’s gospel selection, caught my attention: “Son”, he said. 
listen here

Why is this word so important? It was not the Father from heaven who said it referring to his only-begotten Son, no! It was Jesus who addressed the paralytic who was brought before him to be healed. “Son”, he told him, “your sins are forgiven!”

How many people really believe that we are God’s daughters and sons? Many could not accept this because they think it would make us gods. We believe that we are made human in the image and likeness of God. By being truly human, we are like God! When Jesus was accused of blasphemy because he said he was the son of God, he answered: “Is it not written in your law, ‘I said, you are gods’? If those to whom the word of God came were called ‘gods’—and the scripture cannot be annulled— can you say that the one whom the Father has sanctified and sent into the world is blaspheming because I said, ‘I am God’s Son’?” (Jn 10, 34-36). Psalm 82 says: “I say, ‘You are gods, children of the Most High, all of you’” (Ps 82, 6).

It is important for us to believe and remember frequently that all of us are sons and daughters of God. Let us rejoice that we are God’s children, though sinners and in many ways limited by our humanity.

Jesus called the paralytic, “Son”. He did not immediately treat his illness. Jesus first forgave his sins.

Was the paralytic a sinner? Somebody once said that we are sinners not because we sin; we sin because we are sinners. Psalm 51 says: “Indeed, I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me”. In this he was a sinner like all of us. He was not a sinner in the manner Jews considered those who were sick or in any way handicapped. Let us remember Christ’s answer when his disciples asked him: “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus said to them: “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God’s works might be revealed in him” (Jn 9, 2-3).

By first telling the paralytic: “Your sins are forgiven”, Jesus was doing three things. First, he told the man that he was forgiving the sins he might have committed. Second, he was clearing the taboo, which many a time we still cultivate, that sickness and bad things happen as a punishment for our sins. Indeed, if God had to punish us for all our sins we could as well be totally destroyed. However, God’s mercy is greater than all the sins combined that every human has committed since the beginning of the world. He does not go about punishing us, but is always calling us to conversion. Third, he was teaching him and all of us, how more important is our spiritual health than our bodily health. Remember all the trouble the four men had to bring the paralytic to Jesus for him to heal his body. “When they could not bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him; and after having dug through it, they let down the mat on which the paralytic lay”. Saint John Paul II once said: “Jesus proves, at the same time, that the evil of sin is more dangerous and worrying than physical illness (in this case, serious and chronic disease). He is the Saviour who has come in the first place to remove this serious evil.”

Jesus saw their faith. He saw that they believed he could heal this man; otherwise they would not have taken so much trouble. So he told them that they should take the same sort of trouble not in order to obtain healing of the body but to ask for the forgiveness of sins, to start and walk along the way to sainthood. This is what God ordered Moses: “Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy” (Lev 19, 2).

When Jesus forgave the sins of the paralytic, some scribes were scandalized. “It is blasphemy! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” they questioned in their hearts. Jesus answered by telling them that he who has the power to heal the body by his word, had also the power to forgive sins. All this power of healing and forgiving sins comes from God. He then ordered the man to pick up his mat and go home. The man was healed. Jesus did not touch the man. He did not make any other sign. He only gave and order for the man to go home, which he immediately did before all of those who were present. It is no wonder that they were all amazed and they glorified God.

Jesus gave this power to heal and to forgive sins to his Church. Pope Benedict XVI once said: “The Church, entrusted with the task of extending Christ's mission in time and space, cannot neglect these two essential tasks: evangelization and the care of the sick in body and in mind. Indeed, God wants to heal the whole of man and in the Gospel the healing of the body is a sign of the deeper recovery that is the forgiveness of sins” (cf. Mc 2,1-12).

At the beginning of today’s gospel selection Mark tells us that Jesus was speaking the word to the crowd that had gathered around him. They were listening and they were waiting for something miraculous to happen. Often, we are like this crowd: we listen and we are curious. So many crowds flock to where people say that miracles are happening. Is this bad? Not really, if we follow what the Church tells us to do. It is quite easy for us to be misled by false apparitions. Jesus did not heal everybody … every-body. He did not heal all bodies! He brought comfort and conversion to immense numbers of people, for this is his mission. This is the mission he gave to his Church and we should listen and learn. And then, if he also heals our body, let us thank him, glorify him and make every effort to bring more people to him, like the four men in the gospel did to the paralyzed man.