A Lectio Divina Approach to the Sunday Liturgy
BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD (Series 4, n. 49)
30th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B – October 29, 2006
“He Will Console and Lead Them”
BIBLE READINGS
Jer 31:7-9 // Heb 5:1-6 // Mk 10:46-52
N.B. This new series of BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD: A LECTIO DIVINA APPROACH TO THE SUNDAY LITURGY presents a biblico-liturgical study of the First Reading of each Sunday Mass to serve as background for a better understanding of the Gospel proclaimed in the liturgy. For a biblico-liturgical study of the Gospel for each Sunday, please go to the PDDM Web Archives: WWW.PDDM.US.
I. BIBLICO-LITURGICAL REFLECTIONS
Our dear friend Marietta came to visit us in our convent in Cebu Island, in the Philippines. With her was her ten-year old nephew, Philip who was sick with brain tumor. The malignant disease took his sight away and stunted his growth. The incredibly handsome blind boy looked about six years old. His face was innocent and trusting, his sightless eyes fascinating, and his disposition very lovable. I took his little hands and led him up the stairs to our refectory on the second floor. When we reached the top, he asked me how many steps there were. Greatly amused by his keen sense of observation, I confessed with some embarrassment that I never paid attention to the number of steps on the stairs. He laughed good-naturedly and brightly told me the answer. He then played the organ for us. Since his legs were too short to reach the pair of bellows to pump air, one Sister did it for him as his nimble fingers ran across the keys, producing harmonious sounds. The blind boy also played the guitar like a virtuoso, with the body of the guitar resting on his lap since he was too small to hold the guitar properly. A priest, who came to our Liturgical Center that morning, spent some few precious moments with little Philip. With tears in his eyes, he told the blind boy to remember him when he would “see” Jesus – for Philip knew that he would soon be with Jesus in heaven. Notwithstanding his blindness and sickness, Philip felt loved and marvelous. Indeed, he had received from God the grace of consolation and a special gift of spiritual vision. When the blind boy bid us goodbye, I was overwhelmed with emotion. I had witnessed in Philip a spiritual vision, more perspicacious than I could ever imagine.
This Sunday’s Old Testament reading (Jer 31:7-9) fills us with the warmth of consolation. It depicts the triumphal march of “the remnant of Israel” through the desert, for Yahweh had bestowed salvation on his suffering and chastised people. The privileged group of returning exiles included the blind and the lame in their midst, the mothers and those with child. The caravan of weak people was an eloquent sign of the magnificent and miraculous nature of God’s saving intervention in the lives of his chosen people.
Harold Buetow comments: “Jeremiah’s first 25 chapters represent a message of doom against his people for their dried-up hearts that refused to listen to God’s word. But God wanted Jeremiah also to build and to plant. Today’s passage is taken from the section that represents the ‘sunny side’, Jeremiah’s ‘Little Book of Comfort’. Jeremiah’s warning had gone unheeded, and the destruction he had foretold had come true. Addressing the people of Judah who were exiled to what is the north of modern Iraq, Jeremiah now optimistically looked to future days when his people would come back to the land (30:3). Today’s central theme is the exuberant joy of the return – of an odyssey from spiritual blindness to sight. Opening with a solemn call to joy, the hymn uses strong words like shout, proclaim, and praise. Jeremiah speaks of the remnant (v. 7). In this case the term remnant referred to the small number of those who escaped the calamity of defeat and exile and had been purified to constitute the new Israel, faithful to her God. The term has, however, referred ever since to all those small numbers who remain faithful through all calamities. The returning caravan will consist of the blind, the lame, mothers, those with child, and other physically vulnerable people. The return would be a new exodus, but in a much more glorious form. By saying that they departed in tears (v. 9), Jeremiah begins with allusions to the first Exodus. Unlike the incident in the first Exodus, however, in which water came from a rock, the desert will see brooks of water constantly flowing; unlike the rough going of the first Exodus, here God will lead them on a level road, providing an easier march … Jeremiah had the mission of leading his people along a journey to God, and Jesus had the same mission. Jesus, however, eclipsed Jeremiah in many ways.”
In the light of the prophet Jeremiah’s vision of the gathering of the exiles, the Gospel episode of this Sunday (Mk 10:46-52) concerning the healing of the blind Bartimaeus underlines the great truth that Jesus is our light and salvation, the font of consolation and healing – the restorer and re-newer of all things. Jesus is the great deliver and the leader of the ultimate Exodus. He gathers the great assembly of those who have faith in him and initiates the great paschal journey towards eternal light. He is the way to be followed - the way to salvation – for he is the truth that leads to life. Bartimaeus followed Jesus on the way – the way of the cross, the way of love and service to others, the way we must travel as his disciples. We too must follow Jesus on the way, just like the restored and healed Bartimaeus.
The cure of Bartimaeus is a messianic sign of the final age that is to come. The liturgical scholar, Adrian Nocent remarks: “The remnant of Israel journeys to Jerusalem, but that holy city is itself only a sign of an abiding city. In order to enter this abiding city, this ultimate age, men must be converted and must live by faith. We must be on guard, then, not to stop short at immediate events as though they were an end in themselves. The cure of the blind man is not a goal simply, but also a sign of the world to come. Neither must we stop short at the sacramental signs as though the sign were all; the sign is important because it helps us and our world toward the final day and the complete reconstruction of the world. On this Sunday, therefore, we are urged to deepen our faith by directing it toward the abiding world that is on its way. Every grace we receive should lead us onward to this final day.”
PERSONAL REFLECTION
By Sr. Mary Martha Soza, PDDM
PDDM Community, Fresno, CA-U.S.A.
When Jesus asked Bartimaeus, What do you want me to do for you? He replied: Master, I want to see! At that point, after having shouted and begged for mercy, Bartimaeus, oblivious of the crowd and totally focused on Jesus, believed … and he was healed. His faith in the Divine Master, allowed him to be made whole. And looking at the face of the one who had healed him, Bartimaeus couldn’t do anything less than to follow Him; he knew he had found everything in Jesus!
Although the Divine Master is present in many ways in the world, especially his total and real presence in the Eucharist, for me, it is his indwelling presence within our hearts that captures more profoundly the title of “Master”. We can recognize Him in Sacred Scripture, in the Eucharist or in created reality only if we have made the connection with the Teacher within. And indeed, He is our only Teacher and Master in the real and most crucial meaning of these words. No one can teach us anything real, anything true, except if it is seen, heard or understood with the heart; and the only one that has access to the most profound center of our being is the one who dwells there: the Divine Master.
Jesus heals from within so that we can truly “see” the outer world as it really is and not as a projection of our interior darkness. When God created the world He saw that everything was good … but we have distorted reality and created an illusory world full of fear, darkness and death … we have sinned! Jesus wants to heal us, he wants to restore our inner sight, to give us life.
But do we really want to see or even acknowledge that we are blind? Are we ready to live up to the full implications of receiving our “sight”? Bartimaeus was and he followed Jesus. We need to silence the crowd who discourages us, the voices of our own ego that confuse and darken our sight. We need to learn, like Bartimaeus, to stand on our own ground and to desire with our whole being to be made whole in spite of everything … We need to keep shouting the louder: Master, have pity on me. He will know when it is enough, when we really have come to believe … He is our Divine Master and He heals from within, not only our sight, but the integrity of the entire person. We need only to believe.
II. POINTS FOR THE EXAMINATION OF THE HEART
A. What are our experiences of blindness? What are our personal experiences of healing and consolation?
B. How do we bring God’s power of healing and consolation to our community today, especially to the people who are bedraggled, abandoned, lonely, despairing and vulnerable?
C. Does the figure of Bartimaeus inspire us to go to Jesus, to invoke and plead for our needs, and to grow in faith? Like Bartimaeus, are we eager to follow Jesus “on the way”?
III. PRAYING WITH THE WORD
(Cf. Commission Francophone, Cistercienne, Tropaires des dimanches, 123 // Days of the Lord, vol. 5, p. 279)
Leader: I never saw your face,
but those who know it spoke of it to me.
Since that day I expect your passage
and I hear that today is the day.
Assembly: Jesus, our light, Christ our salvation.
Leader: Blinded by our darkness, far from God, we cry to him.
Lost in the world, with our horizons, we cry to him.
Harboring hope, looking forward to the encounter, we cry to him.
Assembly: Jesus, our light, Christ our salvation.
IV. INTERIORIZATION OF THE WORD
The following is the bread of the living Word that will nourish us throughout the week. Please memorize it.
“I will gather them from the ends of the world, with the blind and the lame in their midst … I will console and guide them …” (Jer 31:8-9)
V. TOWARDS LIFE TRANSFORMATION
A. ACTION PLAN: Pray that God may continue to lead and guide those experiencing physical, moral and spiritual blindness, and that these may put their total trust in him. Make an act of charity on behalf of those experiencing any form of blindness. Find ways to imitate Bartimaeus’ great openness to grace on the road to Jerusalem and his stance of dynamic discipleship: Immediately he received his sight and followed him on the way (Mk 10:52).
B. ACTION PLAN: To help us contemplate more deeply the person of our Lord Jesus Christ, the font of consolation and healing, make an effort to spend an hour in Eucharistic Adoration. Visit the PDDM WEB site (www.pddm.us) for the EUCHARISTIC ADORATION THROUGH THE LITURGICAL YEAR (Vol. 2, n. 49): A Weekly Pastoral Tool.
Prepared by Sr. Mary Margaret Tapang PDDM
PIAE DISCIPULAE DIVINI MAGISTRI
SISTER DISCIPLES OF THE DIVINE MASTER
60 Sunset Ave., Staten Island, NY 10314
Tel. (718) 494-8597 // (718) 761-2323
Website: WWW.PDDM.US