JESUS BREAKS THE LAW

Fr. Marcel Divine Emeka Okwara CSsR

Homily for the 4^th Sunday of Lent, Year A

African Catholic Community in Memphis

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Dearest beloved, Jesus continues to break the law. The Lord continues to attack laws that hinder human freedom, that constitute a stumbling block, that divide the human family. Jesus continues to rubbish human laws, human-made laws that promote discrimination, encourage gender inequality, belittle others just because they don’t look like us, talk like us, worship like us, don’t have the same background and origin like us. Today, the Lord continues his assault on laws that violate love, compassion and mercy.

Last Sunday, we read the story of Jesus and an unnamed Samaritan woman. Jesus tired and hungry from his journey had sat down at the foot of the well. As he was waiting for his disciples whom he had sent out to buy some food to come back, a Samaritan woman came to the well to draw water. Jesus started talking to her. First, he asked her for a drink. But realizing that he was a Jew, the woman replied with a question, “How can you, a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan woman, for a drink?” The Jews of that generation shared nothing in common with the Samaritans. They despised the Samaritans, and considered them less human than themselves. There was a law that forbade Jewish people from associating with the Gentiles. But the Lord does not obey any unjust law that maltreats any child of God. What is human law compared to the life of a daughter of God.

The Samaritan woman was thirsty. She was both physically and spiritually thirsty. The physical thirst is what brings her to the well day after day. Her spiritual thirst, that is, an inner thirst of fulfillment, joy and peace is what drives her from one man to another and for which she hasn’t found any satisfaction. By the time she met Jesus she was in her sixth relationship/marriage, yet she told Jesus she has no husband. When Jesus saw her, he did not see a Gentile woman to be despised and avoided. The Lord saw a woman in pain. He saw a woman whose life has been so messed up that she comes to the well when no one was around just to avoid her shame and guilt and to avoid the ridicule of others. Jesus saw a daughter of God in misery and sorrow. And there is no way he could have ignored her. Imagine for a second the deep pain of this woman who has had five failed marriages and the sixth man in her life was not even her husband. When Jesus saw her, he saw a deficient woman, a sorrowful and a miserable child of God. The Lord saw her loneliness and loneness. Jesus saw a woman who has been messed up by men, used and abused by men. By the time she met Jesus at the well, six men had already debased her and broken her heart and spirit. And the biblical symbolism of six is deficiency, lack, and imperfection. Jesus was the Seventh man. Biblically, seven symbolizes perfection, finality, sufficiency, and fulfillment. Jesus, the Seventh man was all she needed to experience a new life, a new dawn, a new era, and a new history.

Dearest beloved, by talking to this woman Jesus attacked two Jewish laws. He broke the law that forbade any Jewish man from talking to a woman without being in the company of others; he broke the Jewish law that forbade any Jewish person from interacting with a Gentile. Jesus even broke the law further by going into a Gentile town, taking up residence with them for two whole days. He ate their food, drank their water, slept in their homes, mingled together with them in their community. He preached to them, and offered them salvation which the Jews claimed to be exclusively theirs. He also forgave their sins which the Jews view as a blasphemy for they do not believe in the divinity of Jesus, and it’s only God that can forgive sins.

Jesus broke those laws in order to accomplish a higher good. He refused to obey any discriminatory and racial law that looked down on others for not belonging to the so called superior race. He also rubbished the gender law that disfavors women. By doing that, the Lord demonstrates that all human being- male and female are equal. He demonstrates that though we are different- different racial background, different language, different skin color, different language etc, we are still one human family, God’s family, God’s children, created in the image and likeness of God. By upholding her dignity as a woman, Jesus upholds the dignity of all women.

Today, Jesus continues his assault on human laws that make no sense. Today, he gave sight to a man born blind on a Sabbath day. Just because he did not let a child of God to suffer longer, the Pharisees concluded that he is not from God. They said he is not from God because he did a good act on a Sabbath day. May be the Sabbath day is a day of doing nothing, or a day of doing evil. Just because Jesus demonstrated God’s love to a needy man who has never seen the face of his father and mother, never seen how he looks like, never seen how the world looks like, and never appreciated beauty, the Pharisees instantly condemned Jesus and tagged him a renegade. For goodness sake, this blind man was born blind. He has never seen the light of the day. But he is a child of God. And when God remembers him, and decides to take away his suffering, those around complained. They became jealous.

This is what happens in our community, in our society, and even in our families. When God remembers you, when God decides to promote you to a whole new level, those around will start complaining, some would become jealous. But they wouldn’t remember the many years you were suffering, the many years you had part time jobs, and sometimes had to work three jobs just to make a living. But when God remembers you, and gives you a well-paid job, haters of progress will start complaining. They will start wagging their tongues and accusing you of all sorts of things. “He is sinner; she is a sinner and therefore cannot possibly be blessed by God.”

The story of the man born blind in John’s gospel is long and detailed. It is a story of blindness. In this story, the blind is not really the blind man but the Pharisees who were blind to see that what happened to the man born blind is God’s demonstration of his love and the establishment of his kingdom on earth. The disciples on their part demonstrated a lack of knowledge and insight to the whyness of human suffering. For the Jewish people of Jesus’ time, any form of human suffering is as a result of sin. Poverty, sickness, leprosy, blindness and other human calamites are consequences of sin. If you experience any suffering, it means you have sinned. Remember Job! His friends accused him of wrongdoing, hence the loss of everything he had enjoyed.

So when Jesus and his disciples saw the man born blind, the disciples asked Jesus whose fault it is –the man or his parents that he was born blind. Since suffering is the payment for wrongdoing, this man or his parents must have sinned for him to be born blind. Is this not how we view people’s sufferings sometimes? If someone is poor, we conclude he or she must have been lazy. If someone is in a perpetual state of material and financial brokenness, it must be his or her fault. If a man has lost his job, he is the cause. If a woman has not experienced the joy of motherhood, we conclude she committed several abortions when she was single, and now God is punishing her. We easily generalize and conclude that childlessness is due to the immorality and many abortions undertaken by the childless woman. Some even call her a witch! When there is earthquake or a tsunami, we say, God is punishing them for their sinfulness and recklessness. Every human tragedy is hastily seen as God’s punishment on the one who is suffering.

But Jesus gives us a different perspective of looking at human suffering. The Lord tells us that human suffering is not always caused by human faults and wrongdoing. Those who suffer are not always being punished by God. Like the case of the man born blind, suffering makes it possible for the works of God to be made visible. Jesus tells us that neither the man nor his parents had sinned. The Lord tells us, “It’s nobody’s fault. God didn’t make this man blind as a punishment. Rather, this blind man has come to us so that we can be made to see.” His blindness would lead to the opening of our eyes. The blindness of ignorance would be removed so we can see that not all who suffer are being punished.

The Pharisees prefer to see the blind man remain blind. But by coming to the aid of the blind man, the Lord opens our eyes and teaches us what we should do when confronted by human suffering. Although suffering can be redemptive; although suffering can bring about the manifestation of the glory of God, but the glory of God can only be manifested when we like Jesus decide to act. After the Lord had said, “Neither he nor his parents sinned, it is so that the works of God might be made visible through him” he went ahead to open his eyes and thereafter alleviated his pain and suffering.

In his Apostolic Letter titled, “On Human Suffering”, Pope John Paul II used the parable of the Good Samaritan to teach us what we should do when confronted by suffering. The Holy Father argues that even though suffering can bring about healing and salvation through suffering, we should not fold our arms or become passive in suffering. We must do all we can to reduce suffering which is in keeping with the mission of Jesus: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach the good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. The Gospel, Pope John Paul II stresses, is “the negation of passivity in the face of suffering. Christ himself is especially active in this field” when he went about doing good, healing and curing all those who were sick. The world of human suffering calls unceasingly another world, the world of human love.

For John Paul II, “We are not allowed to ‘pass by on the other side’ indifferently; we must ‘stop’ beside the sufferer. Our common origin, the relationship we share must compel us to stop beside those who suffer. Our common humanity must drive us to stop by the side of the one who mostly needs our help, just what the Good Samaritan did. Anyone who stops besides the suffering of another person, whatever form it may take, avers the Pope, is a Good Samaritan. The stop beside the sufferer, explains John Paul II is not for curiosity sake but to be available. It must be a ‘stop’ out of compassion. It must be a profound compassion strong enough to inspire action of bringing help and relief to the sufferer. It is not enough to feel pity and sorry for those who suffer. The pity must drive us into action.

When Jesus saw the man born blind, he did not simply feel sorry for him. He did not tell him, “Oh Sorry! Today is Sabbath, I cannot do anything today. I will attend to you another time.” The Lord disregards a blind observance of the law in order to regard a child of God as a child of God. What is obedience of the law compared to the life of a human being? What is Sabbath compared to the life of God’s child?

Sister and brothers, we are the hands of Jesus reaching out to the entire world today. In the gospel of John 9:5, Jesus says, “As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.” But in the gospel of Matthew 5:14, Jesus declares of us, “You are the light of the world.” This means we are the light of Christ bringing light to those in darkness, bringing sight to those who are blind, blind from seeing the truth. St. Paul in Colossians 1:27 tells us that the Christ in us is the hope of glory. The Christ in us has given us the ability to reach out on his behalf, in his name to the world. Therefore WE ARE THE ARMS OF JESUS!