'You died out of love and did not abandon us in our misery.' Sunday Reflections, 6th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B

Yachounomori Garden,Tatebayashi, Gunma, Japan 

[Wikipedia; photo]

Readings (Jerusalem Bible: Australia, England & Wales, Ireland, New Zealand, Pakistan, Scotland)

Readings (New American Bible: Philippines, USA)

Gospel Mark 1:40-45 (English Standard Version Anglicised, India)

And a leper came to him, imploring him, and kneeling said to him, “If you will, you can make me clean.” Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, “I will; be clean.” And immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean. And Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once, and said to him, “See that you say nothing to anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, for a proof to them.” But he went out and began to talk freely about it, and to spread the news, so that Jesus could no longer openly enter a town, but was out in desolate places, and people were coming to him from every quarter.

Léachtaí i nGaeilge

Lilac Bush 

Vincent van Gogh [Web Gallery of Art]

'The Impressionistic brushstrokes and Japanese style accentuated outline of the iris leaves . . .' (WGA notes).

Two things jumped out at me from the Gospel reading: And a leper came to Jesus, imploring him, and kneeling said to him, “If you will, you can make me clean” and people were coming to him from every quarter. Jesus was moved with pity for the leper and, we can be sure, with pity for the crowds who came looking for him. The gospels are full of stories of Jesus healing individuals and of healing many.

This week I read an article by my Columban confrere Fr Joe Brooder who was two classes behind me in the seminary and who has worked in Japan since 1970, apart from some years in Britain in the 1990s when he visited many parishes there on behalf of the Columbans.

Father Joe's story is about Hiroko, a middle-aged parishioner of his some years ago whose husband was a Protestant. (Only 1.5% of the population is Christian.) They had one daughter who had left the family home. Father Joe wrote: Hiroko had the glorious habit of coming into Mass just as I was starting, sit down in the back pew and as I would be imparting the final blessing at the end of Mass she would dart out of the church with the speed of a swallow leaving her nest after feeding her young and disappear into city air. Hiroko usually went to Sunday Mass but sometimes would not be there for months.

One Monday morning Hiroko turned up at Mass wearing huge sunglasses, which Father Joe saw as some kind of fashion. However, she stayed after Mass and Father Joe approached her, thinking that she wanted to go to confession. However, she told him that her husband was a drunkard who often beat her up. She took of her glasses and the proof was there. Her long periods of absence from Sunday Mass were due to her recovering from ordeals like this. And the abuse of her mother by her father was the reason their adult daughter had left the home.

Father Joe asked Hiroko if she had remembered what the First Reading at the Mass that Monday was about. She did. It was about God's call to Abram to leave his country and to go to the land that He would show him. Hiroko found this comforting. She had already contacted her sister in another part of Japan who had invited her to come and stay. Father Joe, in his own words, 'ordered her' to do just that, as Abram had followed God's call. She said she would.

To Father Joe's astonishment Hiroko returned the following Friday. She told him that she had bought a ticket, packed her bags, called a taxi and put her bags in it. But before she got in she went back to the house and went to look at her husband for the last time. I went into his room, she told the priest. The stench of drink, urine and feces was overwhelming. I looked at him snoring away and turned around to leave the house for good. That was the moment I saw the crucifix on the wall. I could swear that Jesus on the cross was looking down directly on my husband and there was deep compassion and love in His gaze. I fell on my knees and cried out, ‘Oh Jesus, you suffered so much for me and for him here. You died out of love and did not abandon us in our misery. Here I am going to abandon him and seek my own comfort.'

Hiroko went back to the taxi, apologised to the driver, gave him some money and took her bags back into the house where she cleaned up her husband, changed him into fresh clothes and washed all the soiled linen. She spent the night watching over her husband. Now and again I would look up at the crucifix and I swear, Father, that the gaze that came out of the face of Jesus was no longer pity and compassion but that of a serene joy.

Next day her husband of 30 years asked her to take him to hospital. After unburdening herself Hiroko told Father Joe that she had to go back to the hospital as her husband needed her. The priest wrote: She left  me  in  a  daze.  I  was  ashamed  that  I  had  not  the courage to tell her to take up her cross and follow Jesus. I told her to dump her cross and seek her own comfort. At the same moment I knew I was blessed because I knew that I had just met a living saint and a living martyr called Hiroko. I knew I had met love in the flesh. I knew that Hiroko had left me with an example that was divine.

Not long after, Hiroko's estranged daughter, who had left home disgusted with 'Christianity', unexpectedly contacted her mother. When she heard that her father was in hospital she came with her daughter, the grandchild her father didn't know he had. Then something wonderful happened. Hiroko's husband, like the leper who approached Jesus, got down on his knees and apologized for all the pain that he had caused his wife and the brutal example he gave to his daughter. He asked for forgiveness and swore to never take a drop again, a vow he never broke. I was able to visit him in hospital and that brute of a husband became a reformed alcoholic, a reformed husband, a reformed father, a  reformed  Christian,  a  reformed  human  and  all  became a reformed family. The beast had become a lamb. The hot temper he once owned became a kind and gentle temper. He knew he was loved by God, by Jesus, by his wife and daughter. But his health never recovered. He died surrounded by love some months later and was buried out of his own Protestant Church. I am sure he got the surprise of his life when he got past St  Peter and  was  smothered  by  the  mother  he never knew he had - the Blessed Virgin Mary.

One of the verses in today's Responsorial Psalm sums this up: But now I have acknowledged my sins; I said: 'I will confess my offence to the Lord.' And you, Lord, have forgiven the guilt of my sin.'

As it happens, this Sunday is World Day of the Sick, observed each year on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, not observed this year as it falls on Sunday.

Father Joe's article, which touched me very deeply as an expression of the Gospel, the Good News, ends with these words: Time passed. One day Hiroko came to me and said, ‘I am leaving  this  area’.  I presumed she  was going  to  live  with  her daughter. I said ‘Have a good time in Tokyo with your newly-found daughter’. She looked at me and said gently, ‘Father, you once ordered me to leave my country and go like Abram to the land that God was showing me. Now I will obey you. This afternoon I am finally going off to live with my loving big sister far away from here. Goodbye’. I lost all contact with her. But I know where she lives. She lives in my heart still inspiring me, guiding and hopefully praying for me.

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The impact of the story of Hiroko on me is that it points me towards Jesus and I want to be among the people coming to him from every quarter.

Hail Mary in Japanese

courage to tell her to take up her cross and follow Jesus. I

told her to dump her cross and seek her own comfort. At the

same moment I knew I was blessed because I knew that I

had just met a living saint and a living martyr called Hiroko. I

knew I had met love in the esh. I knew that Hiroko had le

me with an example that was divine

just as I was starng, sit down in the back pew and as I would

be imparng the nal blessing at the end of Mass she would

dart out of the church with the speed of a swallow leaving her nest aer feeding her young and disappear into city air.used to come to Sunday Mass just as it had begun and left just before it ended. There were long periods when she didn't attend. One Sunday she arrived wearing very large sunglasses, which Father Joe attributed to some fashion fad.

Traditional Latin Mass

Quinquagesima Sunday

The complete Mass in Latin and English is here. (Adjust the date at the top of that page to 2-11-2024 if necessary).

Epistle: 1 Cor 13:1-13. Gospel: Luke 18:31-43. 

Christ Healing the Blind (1570-75)

Rembrandt [Web Gallery of Art]

Jesus  asked him, 'What do you want me to do for you?' He said, 'Lord, let me receive my sight' (Luke 18:40-41; Gospel).