Homily: October 18 - St. Luke, evangelist - "Our beloved Physician"

St. Luke’s Gospel was written between 70 and 85 A.D.  Tradition holds him to be a native of Antioch, where the Saint we honored yesterday, Ignatius of Antioch, was Bishop. 

Luke was not one of the twelve apostles or one of Jesus’ disciples; for Luke was a Gentile convert.  So, he is probably the only non-Jewish writer of the entire Bible.  Each of the Gospel writers has a particular insight into the personality of Jesus, and Luke presents Jesus as the Great Physician, healer of bodies and souls.  This emphasis was natural to him because Luke himself was a doctor, and is the patron saint of medical doctors.  In his letter to the Colossians St. Paul even refers to Luke as “Our Beloved Physician”. 

Our parish celebrates annually a Mass for the Anointing of the Sick near the feast of St. Luke.  And today, with the school children we will celebrate a White Mass, for doctors, nurses, and other health care professionals. 

Luke relates over a dozen healing miracles of Jesus: he heals the blind, the hemorrhaging woman, the centurion’s servant, he casts out demons, we heard last Sunday Luke’s account of Jesus cleansing 10 lepers.  Luke stresses Jesus’ compassion and patience with sinners and the suffering, and that Jesus died for Jews and Gentiles alike. 

I don’t think it’s a coincidence that it is Luke, the doctor, who stresses that salvation is offered to all.  The word salvation comes from the word salve—a healing ointment, which St. Luke, a doctor would have been familiar.  Through Luke’s writings, you can even imagine this healing balm being poured out from heaven beginning with the saving Passion, Death, and Resurrection in Jerusalem and spreading to the ends of the earth in the Acts of the Apostles, which he also wrote.  In the Acts of the Apostles we see the Church continuing God’s saving mission bringing the most important healing—the forgiveness of sins—and bringing wholeness to divided humanity.

We honor St. Luke, our beloved Physicians, and ask him to pray for us and to obtain from God for us healing for our wounded spirits, healing for our physical burdens, healing of our spiritual blindnesses and leprosies, that we may know the full power of the healing and grace that flows from Christ and his Cross for the glory of God and salvation of souls.