How can human contact break down the barriers that separate us?
Every culture has its taboos: forbidden practices or behaviors,
prohibitions based on notions of morality or danger or even taste. When, in Mark’s Gospel the woman afflicted with hemorrhages for twelve
years makes her way through the crowd in order to touch Jesus’ cloak, she is doing the unthinkable: she is rendering Jesus unclean because to
touch a woman in this condition was taboo, and she herself is ostracized
because of it; no relationship is possible for her. Yet Jesus is not angered by her touch nor is
he concerned with ritual impurity; for him, the woman’s great faith trumps any
socially constructed prohibition, and he heals her: Daughter, your faith has saved you, he says. Likewise, because of the great faith of her
father, Jesus touches the dead daughter of Jairus, breaking down the barriers,
bringing her back into community, back into relationship. Jesus offers both the
woman and the girl a new sense of belonging; his generosity imparts love to
their lives, proclaiming the love that appears to be in such short supply. He has done what the narrator of Psalm 30 so
appreciates: you brought me up from the netherworld, the psalmist says, You changed my mourning into dancing. You brought me back into relationship, in
other words; your touch has made me whole.
We often create a bubble or barrier around ourselves: those who are within the barrier are acceptable, while those without are not
worthy of our attention, not worthy of contact with us. Yet Paul
tells the Corinthians that their responsibility is not just to those within
their elite Corinthian bubble but also to needy Christians of other communities
as well: your abundance at the present time should supply their needs, he
tells them. Christianity is about
support for and contact with all, not
just some, so that all may have
life. Because, as Wisdom reminds us, God fashioned all things that they may have
being, and the creatures of the world are wholesome. Division, separation, barriers, walls: these are all human constructions imposed on
the goodness of Creation against the will of God. It is our job to reach out to others, to
destroy the barriers that separate us, to make the fundamental connections that ensure relationship, so that we might enjoy that relationship, both with other and with God.
This post is based on Fr. Pat's Scripture class.
Image source: Wordle
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