4th Week of Lent 2025 - Tuesday - Healing Waters of Christ

 

Yesterday, I reflected upon how Lent is a spiritual springtime—a time of new life, spiritual healing and spiritual growth. Today, the scripture readings continue these ideas of fruitfulness, healing, and new life.

In our first reading from the Prophet Ezekiel, we encounter a magnificent vision: waters trickling forth from beneath the temple, gradually deepening into a vast river. This river brings renewal and abundant life wherever it flows, transforming even salty seas into fresh waters teeming with life. Trees lining the riverbanks flourish abundantly, their leaves serving as medicine and their fruits as nourishment.

The imagery from Ezekiel reminds us that wherever God’s grace flows, new life emerges, healing occurs, and everything it touches is renewed and restored. During this Lenten season, God’s grace can renew us, as we engage in Lenten prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.

In the Gospel, Jesus brings healing and life to a man who had been suffering for nearly forty years.  The man is healed when he listens to and obeys the command of Jesus.

Just as Ezekiel’s river healed and revitalized everything it touched, Christ Himself is the living water, bringing renewal to the sick, the broken, and the despairing. Yet, just as importantly, today's Gospel challenges us to reflect upon our openness and willingness to be healed by Christ.

The man at the Pool of Bethesda represents all who have experienced long periods of spiritual stagnation or brokenness. We often remain spiritually "paralyzed" by sin, fear, resentment, or doubt. Like the man, we might find ourselves waiting passively, feeling helpless. Jesus asks the same question to each of us during Lent that he asked to the man: "Do you want to be well?" Do you want healing? Do you want restoration?

Many Christians fail to recognize their need for spiritual healing. They think. I’m fine. I’m a good person. But Lent is a time of honest self-examination, where we recognize that there are always parts of us that need healing. They way we treat strangers, they way we spend our free time, the way we react when we are stressed, frustrated, what we do when we are anxious about the future.

When we allow Christ to heal and cleanse us, something transformative occurs—not just within us, but in how we impact the world around us. Just as Ezekiel’s life-giving river spread outward, nourishing everything it touched, our healed and renewed lives extend God’s grace to others. A Christian who experiences genuine healing and renewal becomes a source of life and blessing to others.

Let us respond well to the Lord’s offer of healing this Lent, that we may become vibrant streams of Christ’s life-giving grace in the world, for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

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Confident in God's desire to heal, renew, and restore, we now present our prayers and petitions with hopeful hearts.

For the Church, that during this Lenten season, she may continue to proclaim the healing and transformative power of Christ, inviting all people to experience renewal and new life, especially those who feel spiritually stagnant, broken, or discouraged. Let us pray to the Lord.

For leaders throughout the world, that they may be guided by God's wisdom and grace to foster justice, peace, and well-being, enabling communities to flourish. Let us pray to the Lord.

For those who suffer physically, mentally, or emotionally, that they may experience the healing presence of Christ, who restores strength, hope, and wholeness. Let us pray to the Lord.

For our deceased loved ones, that through God's merciful love, they may experience the fullness of life and eternal joy in His presence. Let us pray to the Lord.

Heavenly Father, pour forth your healing grace upon us. Hear these prayers we offer with confidence and trust, through Christ our Lord.

4th Week of Lent 2024 - Tuesday - Jesus the Water of Life

Yesterday, I mentioned how the 4th Sunday of Lent was a sort of dividing line in the Lenten season. During the first half of Lent, the scripture readings focus on penance, repentance, prayer, fasting, and almsgiving which help us to bring our passions under control. 

This second half of Lenten assumes that we still continue to practice Lenten penances, of course, but the scripture readings and mass orations speak a lot more about grace, life, healing, and purification. 

In scripture and tradition, these spiritual realities are symbolized often by water. We hear of water in both of our readings today: water flowing out of the temple, water with healing properties at the pool of Bethesda.

Water is essential for physical life; nothing can live without it. In many biblical stories, water is a source of life and growth. Just as water nourishes, cleanses, and sustains physical life, grace, healing, and spiritual life are the divine nourishment and sustenance for the soul. This parallel makes water a natural symbol for the life-giving grace of God. Water quenches the thirst of our bodies--God quenches the thirst of our soul--we were made for him.

Water is a means of cleansing. We wash our cars, we wash our houses, we wash our bodies, with water. Water washes away dirt, impurity, and contagions. So too, it is used sacramentally, to symbolize the washing away of sin in the baptism, and we even use blessed water to purify objects and places exposed to the contagion of evil. 

That water is needed by all people, in all places, and all times, reminds us of how God is needed by all people, in all places, and at all times. 

Water has the power to change landscapes, erode rock, nourish dry land, and create channels of new life. Just as water can lead to dramatic changes in the physical world, God’s grace leads to significant changes in our spiritual lives and personal circumstances.

Water flows, moves, and follows a path. This dynamic quality of water makes it a symbol for the guidance and direction of the Holy Spirit in a believer's life. Just as a river follows its path, so does the Spirit guide us to the sea of God’s infinite goodness. 

Water flows from the Temple in the first reading today, foreshadowing how the water will flow from the side of Christ at his crucifixion and how the waters of baptism flow from the Church to all corners of the world, but recall that it is not water in itself that has the power to save us. Water, in fact, is shown to be insufficient in the Gospel today; it is Jesus who heals, it is Jesus who saves: A reminder that the saving waters of baptism are only capable of bringing new spiritual life, because of Christ. He is the living water--whoever comes to him shall never thirst, He is the one that causes a deep well of grace within our souls to spring up to eternal life. Praised be Jesus Christ, now and forever, for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

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As the Solemnity of Easter approaches, dear brethren, let our prayer to the Lord be all the more insistent:

That God may be pleased to increase faith and understanding in the catechumens and those to be fully initiated in the coming Paschal Solemnity

For Peace throughout the nations of the world most threatened by hatred, division, and violence, for the protection of the unborn and the safety of the men and women in our armed forces.  

That all families will commit themselves to fervent prayer this Lent so as to grow in greater love and holiness.  

For the physical, emotional, and spiritual healing of all people, especially the spiritually blind and hard of heart.  

For all those who have died, for all the poor souls in purgatory, for those who have fought and died for our country’s freedom, and for…  

Have mercy, O Lord, on the prayers of your Church and turn with compassion to the hearts that bow before you, that those you make sharers in the divine mystery may never be left without your assistance. Through Christ our Lord.

4th Week of Lent 2022 - Tuesday - Good versus evil

 

Yesterday, we reflected upon the second of the seven miracles stories in St. John’s Gospel: the healing of the royal official’s son. We also noted how St. John often includes people’s reactions to those miracles: some are amazed by Jesus, some come to believe, some fail to make that leap of faith or they walk away grumbling because his subsequent teachings are unappealing or deemed too difficult.

What was the reaction to the miracle detailed in today’s Gospel of the paralyzed man. On one hand, you have the obedience and witness of the man himself. He gets up and walks just as Jesus told him to do. When asked about the miracle, he testifies to the source of the healing. He is certainly a model for all of us. We are to testify to the healing we have received through Jesus Christ. 

For Jesus has healed our paralysis—our spiritual paralysis. Without the healing each of us have received in the pool of baptism, we would be paralyzed of walking toward heaven, walking in righteousness, walking in truth, walking up to the altar of God, God who is the source of our joy. Jesus has changed my life, and I know he has changed yours as well. And when people ask us about what animates our lives. We need to point to Him. You know what gets me up in the morning? The desire to serve my Lord who has healed me. We should not be timid about our faith.

So the Gospel contains this wonderful reaction of obedience and witness. But there was another reaction—that of the Jews, the religious authorities of Jerusalem. Their hearts were so far from God that they could not, or would not, recognize the goodness of what Jesus did. This man had been paralyzed for 38 years. Most of us cannot imagine what his life was like. The inability to work to support a family. The boredom. The abandonment. And the religious leaders criticize Jesus, when none of them lifted a finger to help the man into the pool. 

And for healing this man, freeing this man, liberating this man, restoring his hopes, helping him to know the love of God, the religious leaders, St. John tells us, begin to persecute Jesus. That was their response. “Goodness made itself known, and we can’t let that happen again.” Do you see how the powers of evil were rampant in the hearts of Jesus’ enemies?

As we near Holy Week, this reading helps us to understand the conflict that will reach its crescendo on Good Friday: the goodness of God—the life and the healing and moral and spiritual freedom God wants for us—versus the evil that takes root in the hearts—the coldness of the hell we make for ourselves when we turn away from God and seek to selfishly control and manipulate our fellow man.

Lent: it helps us to be open to the healing Jesus wants to work in our lives, it strengthens us to have courage to lead others to Jesus. It also helps us to repent and do penance for those time, when like those religious authorities, have coldly closed ourselves to the goodness of God. 

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For an increase in faith for the catechumens and candidates who approach the sacraments of initiation in the coming Paschal Solemnity.

That the Church might be delivered and protected from all evil—all coldness toward good, all indifference to life, all selfishness, error, heresy, schism, and unbelief.

For strength to resist temptation, and the humility to sincerely repent of sin.

That through fasting and self-denial, we may be ever more conformed to Christ.

That those in need may find assist in the charity of faithful Christians and that peace and security may be firmly established in all places.

For all who have died, and for all the poor souls in purgatory, and for X. for whom this Mass is offered.

Mercifully hear, O Lord, the prayers of your Church and turn with compassion to the hearts that bow before you, that those you make sharers in your divine mystery may always benefit from your assistance.

4th Week of Lent 2019 - Tuesday - The drama begins

Yesterday, we began reading from the series of seven miracles in John’s Gospel, and today we read the third miracle, the healing of the man at the waters of Bethesda, pools of water that were open to the public, near the northern sheep gate of Jerusalem. The waters were thought to have healing properties, but healing eluded this crippled man for thirty-eight years. In the end, it was not the water at all that brought him healing, rather, his faith in Jesus Christ, the healing word of Jesus.

The power of faith, obedience to the word of Jesus, links yesterday’s gospel miracle, and today’s. Today’s story begins the drama which will continue to unfold and eventually lead to the climax of Good Friday.

The Jewish leaders, witnessing Jesus’ miracle, instead of responding to the miracle with faith, harden their hearts, and St. John tells us they begin to “persecute” Jesus. “Persecute” in the sense that they begin to obstruct his holy work and bring suffering to him,

One scripture commentary said that John’s use of the word “persecute” also has the resonance of “legal prosecution” for the Jewish leaders here begin to build a legal case against him, and bring judgment against him, accusing him of crime that will enable them to silence Him.
This reminds me of the beginning of the book of Job, were Satan, whose name means the “Accuser” seeks to build a legal case against Job. The Satanic spirit works to silence Jesus, to obstruct his work of salvation.

This reminds us of that opening prayer of Ash Wednesday, which spoke of Lent as a spiritual campaign, a spiritual battle being waged in us. While we seek to conform ourselves to Jesus through our Lenten penances, while the catechumens seek to ready themselves for the saving waters of baptism, Satan seeks to obstruct the work of God in us, to tempt us away from penance, to close our ears to the truths the Word wishes to speak to us, to hinder us in responding to God in faith.

While we increase our penances, temptation may also increase, forces which obstruct the work of God might conspire against us. So we keep our eyes and our hearts fixed on Jesus throughout Lent, knowing that through his suffering and death, he brings about victory over the forces of evil, and plants his spirit within us to endure suffering and hardship for the sake of the kingdom, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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For an increase in faith for the catechumens and candidates who approach the sacraments of initiation in the coming Paschal Solemnity.
That the Church might be delivered and protected from all spirits of error, heresy, schism, and unbelief, and that Christians who are persecuted for the Gospel might persevere in faith.
For strength to resist temptation, and the humility to sincerely repent of sin.
That through fasting and self-denial, we may be ever more conformed to Christ.
That those in need may find assist in the charity of faithful Christians and that peace and security may be firmly established in all places.
For all who have died, and for all the poor souls in purgatory, and for X. for whom this Mass is offered.
Mercifully hear, O Lord, the prayers of your Church and turn with compassion to the hearts that bow before you, that those you make sharers in your divine mystery may always benefit from your assistance.