The texts from the Roman Catholic Lectionary today invite contemplation of our thanksgiving for grace acting through healing.
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| Place for grace |
The reading from the Letter to the Colossians begins with a Pauline thanksgiving for the grace exhibited in the community.
* [1:3–8] On thanksgiving at the start of a letter, see note on Rom 1:8. The apostle, recalling his own prayers for them and the good report about them he has received (Col 1:3–4), congratulates the Colossians upon their acceptance of Christ and their faithful efforts to live the gospel (Col 3:6–8). To encourage them he mentions the success of the gospel elsewhere (Col 1:6) and assures them that his knowledge of their community is accurate, since he has been in personal contact with Epaphras (Col 1:7–8), who likely had evangelized Colossae and other cities in the Lycus Valley of Asia Minor (cf. Col 4:12, 13; Phlm 23). On faith, love, and hope (Col 1:4, 5, 8), see note on 1 Cor 13:13; cf. 1 Thes 1:3; 5:8.1
Psalm 52 declares that like an olive tree the righteous will flourish.
* [52:10] Like an olive tree: the righteous will flourish in the house of God like a well-watered olive tree, cf. Ps 92:14; 128:3.2
The journey of Jesus in the Gospel of Luke includes cure of Simon’s mother-in-law among other healings as the “Son of God” leaves Capernaum.
* [4:38] The house of Simon: because of Luke’s arrangement of material, the reader has not yet been introduced to Simon (cf. Mk 1:16–18, 29–31). Situated as it is before the call of Simon (Lk 5:1–11), it helps the reader to understand Simon’s eagerness to do what Jesus says (Lk 5:5) and to follow him (Lk 5:11).3
Amy Hoover shares that today was simply an invitation for her to consider her response to the healing and mercy of God.
It strikes me that Simon’s mother-in-law is “paying it forward” so to speak. She is using the gifts she has, preparing and serving food, to express her gratitude and in turn, minister and proclaim the Good News. My prayer with this scripture challenged me to consider how I “pay it forward” when I received not only God’s love and mercy but gifts from others as well, in effect manifesting the continual incarnation of God.4
Don Schwager quotes “Jesus the Chief Physician,” by St Jerome (347-420 AD).
"'Now Simon's mother-in-law was kept in her bed sick with a fever.' May Christ come to our house and enter in and by his command cure the fever of our sins. Each one of us is sick with a fever. Whenever I give way to anger, I have a fever. There are as many fevers as there are faults and vices. Let us beg the apostles to intercede for us with Jesus, that he may come to us and touch our hand. If he does so, at once our fever is gone. He is an excellent physician and truly the chief Physician. Moses is a physician. Isaiah is a physician. All the saints are physicians, but he is the chief Physician." (excerpt from HOMILIES ON THE GOSPEL OF MARK 75.1)5
The Word Among Us Meditation on Colossians 1:1-8 points out all that was going well for them. Paul was paving the way for the correction he would have to give them later. By focusing first on thanksgiving, Paul kept God’s blessings in the forefront of his mind—and theirs as well.
Like moistening or waxing the end of a thread to help it fit through the eye of a needle, thanksgiving can help us sharpen and focus our intercessory prayer. When we start praying for a situation by giving thanks for all the good that God is already doing there, our hope is built up. So is our trust in God’s plan as well as our confidence that he will intervene according to his own wisdom and timing.6
Dr. Richard L. Pratt, Jr. explains the purpose and distinctive features of the Letter to the Colossians.
The Colossian epistle addressed Christians who had come under the influence of a false teaching that mixed elements of Greek philosophy with Judaism. In part, this movement taught that the Colossian Christians were subject to a variety of spiritual forces that needed to be placated through veneration, asceticism and the observance of special holy days.7
Friar Jude Winkler comments on the authorship of the letters to the Colossians and Ephesians. The language in the Gospel may reveal Luke as a physician. Friar Jude notes the “higher Christology” in the declaration of Jesus as “Son of God” by a spiritual being.
Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM, introduces Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955) who was a Jesuit paleontologist and mystic whose writings were suppressed by Catholic authorities during his lifetime. Today there’s a growing appreciation for his work which brings science and religion together and mobilizes Christians to participate with God in the process of bringing the universe to its fulfillment in Christ. In particular, Franciscans resonate with Teilhard. Fr Richard first discovered him in college in the early 1960s, during the heady years of the Second Vatican Council, when he filled Richard Rohr with a cosmic, earthy vision for his life. What did Teilhard mean by “the cosmic Christ”? Dr. Beatrice Bruteau (1930–2014) explained.
The central conception in Teilhard’s notion of the cosmic Christ is that “the universe forms one natural whole, which finally can subsist only by dependence from [Christ]. That’s the main thing.” [1] Teilhard sees himself as “the evangelist” of “Christ in the universe,” one who preaches Christ as containing “all the unyielding immensity and grandeur of the world.” [2] His “fundamental vision” [3] as expressed in The Divine Milieu is of Christ as All-in-everything, in its reality and in its future.8
Our experience of grace and healing may be in our family and friends, in our own difficulties, and in contemplation of the “order” of the universe and nature.
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