You can see

The text from the Gospel of Mark today in the Roman Catholic Lectionary tells of a unique healing miracle by Jesus of a blind man. This episode is only recorded in Mark and it is a two stage healing which is initiated by friends bringing the blind man to Jesus and Jesus pausing during His encounter with the man to ask "Do you see anything?" (Mark 8:23). The first reading today from the Letter of James extols us to go beyond a faith based in ideas and plans to faith which is love in action. The partial opening of our consciousness of the Presence of God in the world may come from study, preaching, idealism, exegesis and contemplation. This spiritual preparation is eye opening. We may understand from our study that we are called to be Christ in the world. Our faith action may involve accepting the other who is brought to us through our daily experience. We may be the friends who help the other to find some acceptance. We may be the influence that opens the eyes of the other to possibilities of seeing life differently. Like Jesus, we need to check in with those who are travelling with us and assess how they are seeing. What is the state of their spiritual and physical health. We need to continue to offer our hands of presence and support in faith that the healing of others, like our own spiritual growth, is a process, as noted by Michael Kavan of Creighton University, which requires our participation and the witness of the great crowd of members of His Body which surround us. Our faith in the Transcendent Presence to change how we see and understand is strengthened by the practices of concern for the outcast and rejection of dark influence which are enumerated by the psalmist today as characteristic of those who will not be moved from their life in faith which improves the vision of their spiritual eyes.