Confronted by a contagious disease with frightful consequences, an entire people protect themselves from illness by social distancing, by isolating the infected, by mandating special clothing, and by shaming and shunning those who will not cooperate with this approach to public health.
I speak, of course, about leprosy, but after our experience of the coronavirus pandemic, perhaps we are a bit better equipped to understand the ancient measures which separated lepers from everyone else and to appreciate the extraordinary appeal of a man who could cut through fear and danger, heal the sick, and restore to human fellowship and to divine worship those who had been expelled from both because of their disease.
That is why a leper knelt before Jesus and begged him for healing. The Lord was moved with pity, and Mark tells us that Jesus stretched out his hand and touched the leper. If Christ had been a man only, then this touch would have rendered Jesus himself unclean, but instead, the Lord Jesus revealed his divine glory through his mastery over nature, and he healed the man. “The leprosy left him immediately, and he was made clean.” (Mark 1:42)
Holy Scripture always speaks to us at multiple levels and with several meanings, and to understand any text in the Bible we must distinguish between the literal and the spiritual meanings of each text. In addition to the obvious and literal sense of Scripture, our theological tradition counts three other spiritual senses or meanings, and they are called the allegorical sense, the moral sense, and the mystical or anagogical sense.
First, the allegorical sense allows us to understand the meaning of one event by reference to another. For example, the children of Israel crossed from slavery to freedom by passing through the waters of the Red Sea, and Christians do the same through the waters of Holy Baptism.
Second, the moral sense allows us to understand that the words of Scripture teach us how to live in righteousness, a teaching which can shape our lives in the truth. For example, Saint Paul gives such instruction today in the second lesson when he writes: “whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God.” (1 Cor:10, 31)
And third, the mystical or anagogical sense, from the Greek word for leading, helps us understand how everything in Holy Scripture leads us to the glory of sharing the divine life of the Trinity. For example, the Church on earth is the seed and beginning of the heavenly Jerusalem, which is our true homeland and eternal destiny, and so our life in the Church now, however messy it may be, is a preparation for everlasting life.
In today’s Gospel we find both the literal sense and all three spiritual senses of Scripture at work at the same time. Leprosy was a terrible disease beyond the skill of medical science to cure until very recently, and so Christ’s healing of the leper was the literal restoration to health of one particular man who was otherwise doomed to a living death. But in this one action of Christ are also contained three universal spiritual meanings for us:
First, sin is a disease, a spiritual illness that separates us from God and from authentic human fellowship, and the sickness of sin subjects us to dreadful consequences that can easily spread to others as we contaminate them with our selfishness.
Second, only Christ can cure us from sin sickness, and so we must turn to him with faith, hope, and love to be made clean. But this requires of us that we first acknowledge that our sins are sins and that in our sins we are unclean. No sin is forgiven even by God until it is acknowledged to be a sin and confessed as such by the sinner.
Third, if we acknowledge our sins and turn to the Lord for mercy and healing, then we are immediately cleansed and restored to fellowship with God, with all others, and with our own true selves. In this way we are being prepared by the Lord both to join the communion of the saints in glory on the Last Day and to announce the Gospel of salvation in our day.
And so the Psalmist proclaims:
“Blessed the man to whom the Lord imputes not guilt, in whose spirit there is no guile. I acknowledged my sin to you, my guilt I covered not. I said, ‘I confess my faults to the Lord,’ and you took away the guilt of my sin. Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, you just; exult, all you upright of heart.” (Psalm 32:2, 5, 11)
Friends, let us be mindful of all four of these meanings of Scripture as we begin this Wednesday our annual journey to Jerusalem, the Forty Days of penance and prayer during which we are called to examine our lives in the light of Gospel truth.
Then in the light of that truth we can confess our sins, receive forgiveness, and be conformed ever more perfectly by grace through faith, hope, and love to the life, death, and Resurrection of the only one who can heal us and restore us to the dignity and freedom of the children of God. He is the Messiah of Israel and the divine Redeemer of the world: the Lord Jesus Christ.
This is the text of my homily for the Sixth Sunday of the Year.
Fr Jay Scott Newman
Thank you. I do miss your homilies- beautiful.