Opening Prayer for the Season of Creation (adapted)
Creator of All, we are grateful that from your communion of love you created our planet to be a home for all. By your Holy Wisdom you made the Earth to bring forth a diversity of living beings that filled the soil, water and air. Each part of creation praises you in their being, and cares for one another from our place in the web of life. We wonder at the marvels of your creation which enrich our lives, nourish us, and stand as testimony to your loving gifts to all of us. With the Psalmist, we sing your praise that in your house “even the sparrow finds a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may lay her young.” We remember that you call human beings to keep your garden in ways that honor the dignity of each creature and conserve their place in the abundance of life on Earth. In the name of the One who came to proclaim good news to all creation, Jesus Christ.
1st Reading: Isaiah 35:4-37
2nd Reading: The Letter of James 2:1-5
Gospel: Mark 7:31-37
Homily: John Hushon
Today’s Gospel describes one of the miracle stories (healing the deaf man), a story that Mark shares with Matthew. First, a bit of context, as you have come to expect from me.
This story is early in Mark’s Gospel but is one of many miracle stories. In all, according to John Meier, there are about 30 miracle stories spread over all the gospels. They are described as “Mighty Deeds” in Mark, Matthew and Luke and “Signs” in John. They are meant to show that Jesus, the God-man, either in his own right or by calling upon the God-Creator and Sustainer of all life, can change the ordinary, rational course of human events–often, but not always, by engaging human agency.
Most biblical scholars divide the miracles into three categories
- Healing in body, mind or spirit—power over illness, disease and evil (illness was often associated with sin)
- Power over the incidents of nature and the material world
- Power to raise the dead
While the healing stories have parallels in the faith healers of the time of Jesus (most of whom seemed to be from “the East” or Egypt)—the other miracle stories have no parallels in literature of the time. And the way Jesus performed his healing miracles was different from the techniques employed by the faith healers—they did not involve incantations or personal gain.
Miracle stories quickly became an important element in the conversion of many early Christians—proof that Jesus was either a God-man or had the extra-ordinary ability to call upon the power of God to do so.
Much later in the history of the Church, the miracle stories became a stumbling block in the faith journey of the Enlightenment philosophers and many of our own Founding Fathers—perhaps the first rationalists or scientists. They could not understand the existence of evil in the world and therefore concluded that God did not intervene in the “ordinary” affairs of humans and nature. They tried to explain them away as either the naïve beliefs of “poor peasants” or with rational explanations. We have all heard many of these.
But there is an old/new way of thinking emerging. We are beginning to accept that while we can explain many things, we cannot explain everything. Wonder exists again. St Augustine’s principle that we worship an infinite creating and SUSTAINING God seems true again.
About a dozen years ago, when I took the course in the Synoptic Gospels from a well-known Franciscan at Washington Theological Union, we were required to write a paper on a scene from one of the Gospels. I chose a miracle story. Why? I was one of those “rationalists” who tried to explain every miracle with a plausible story. I wanted my faith founded on reason: something St Augustine tells us over and over is impossible—it is the other way around. I needed to confront this block to my faith journey. I tried to explain away the miracle with a rational subtext, focusing on the literary elements of Mark’s Gospel style—but I knew I was missing the point. Several years later, teaching the same Gospel, I tried that again with my class. An older student, clearly of stronger faith than I, asked me, “Do you believe in the Resurrection?” “Of course,” I answered. “Then all the rest is easy. End of story”
Quite simply, if we believe in the Resurrection, anything is possible with our God. Put another way, if God gives us the gift of faith that the Resurrection happened, everything else is possible.
Go forward a few years. Elizabeth Johnson published her groundbreaking Theology 101 book. In it she talks at length about the mystery and complexity of our God. Every time we think we grasp who God is, or we are tempted to say, “I know God and….”, we must realize our attempt falls short of the wondrous mystery of our God.
If we reject God or God’s work because we don’t understand how it fits into our constructed rational world, we substitute PRIDE (our belief that we can understand anything if we only try hard enough and have enough intelligence and education) for FAITH.
My problem was not the inability to understand the apparent inconsistency between a perfect all-powerful God and the existence of evil and suffering in the world—it was lack of faith. It is time to once again marvel at the wonders of Creation as it reflects the love of our God. And accept that miracles, big and small happen.
Let pride go. Believe and marvel in the beneficence of our God—particularly when we experience it at important times in our life: the love and care of a spouse, the birth of a child or grandchild, the marriage of a daughter, the striving of an athlete to achieve what had never been done before, a sculpture or painting or music which conveys unbelievable beauty. As both Hans Kung and Karl Rahner say, “The first step in faith is to be open to the possibility of the Divine.” The wonder of our God will overwhelm us. Put on childlike wonder. Suspend disbelief. Miracles happen every day. How can we not believe? Thank you, God, for those moments when we encounter You in the wonder and power and love of your creation.
Caridad I:
I am suggesting the circumstances surrounding the miracle are culturally supportive. At Cana the water was changed to wine and the containers were there as the guests would expect.
In the case of Our Lady of Guadalupe, she appeared as a dark-skinned young pregnant woman. She spoke in the Indian language the messenger understood. She was dressed in a mantle and tunic of colors meaningful to the future messenger and the Indian population. She was surrounded by the songs of birds and with flowers which indicated to Juan Diego she came from heaven, as he understood it. She responded to the request by the bishop for a sign by sending the picture of herself on Juan Diego’s mantle – the image now revered at the Basilica erected at her request. Millions of pilgrims visit the shrine every day and many of her devotees return to thank her for favors received and leave tokens of their gratitude – referred to as “milagritos.”
Judy H: A Scientist’s take on Miracles
The more we investigate the universe the more we understand and we realize there is so much more we don’t know. It does seem like there is some overall guidance at work. Yes, there are mutations that make life forms stronger and therefore are passed along to the betterment of that species. And this form of evolution is sort of hit or miss (or trial by fire).
But it is hard to imagine the lack of a creator when one looks at something as exotic as a passion flower or some of the truly unique reef fish. It is also amazing that similar forms have evolved independently in different locations. Yes, they are probably responding to pressures of a similar ecological niche, but it does seem amazing. Maybe a creator also has a hand in making the beauty of sunsets and rainbows available to humans to appreciate and glory in. Our world would be much duller without them. Often science leads us to discern how something occurs, but not the why. That is the miracle.
Diana K:
I’d like to relate a personal miracle from my childhood. I grew up as an only child in New York City (NYC) with my mother and maternal grandmother. My father lived in Indiana with his new family. I would visit them over the summer and it was a challenge accepting this new family: stepmother, stepbrother, and new baby. I had a hard time and one night as I stood by a window, I prayed, “God, I need you. I need your help with this.” Upon returning to NYC for the start of third grade, I had a beloved teacher who pointed me to the God I needed. She offered to take any of her interested students to church and teach them about the Catholic faith. While my mother and grandmother were Catholic, they were not regular church-goers. When I returned to Indiana the next summer, I had a different perspective on love and was able to accept and come to love my father’s new family. My teacher came to me in my time of need and pointed the way to faith.
Post Liturgy sharing included a saving from drowning, an appendicitis attack leading to a colon cancer diagnosis and treatment, a transformed life thanks to a therapist’s care, a birth, a daughter being able to hold her father’s hand a day before he died.
Commitment in Community for Creation:
In this Season of Creation, we pray that the breath of your creative Word would move our hearts, as in the waters of our birth and baptism. Give us faith to follow Christ to our just place in the beloved community. Enlighten us with the grace to respond to your covenant and call to care for our common home. In our tilling and keeping, gladden our hearts to know that we participate with your Holy Spirit to renew the face of your Earth, and safeguard a home for all. Amen.
Lord’s Prayer: (adapted for the Season of Creation)
Eternal Spirit, Earth-maker, Pain-bearer, Life-giver, Source of all that is and shall be, Father and Mother of us all, Loving God, in whom is heaven: The hallowing of your name echoes through the universe! The way of your justice be followed by the peoples of the world! Your heavenly will be done by all created beings! Your beloved community of peace and freedom sustain our hope and come on earth. With the bread we need for today, feed us. In the hurts we absorb from one another, forgive us. In times of temptation and test, strengthen us. From trials too great to endure, spare us. From the grip of all that is evil, free us. For you reign in the glory of the power that is love, now and forever. Amen.
Community Declaration of Our Unity in Communion:
by Sylvia Diss, with inspiration from St. Augustine
We are the Body of Christ, called together into this community. We offer our gifts, our lives, our commitment in loving service to each other, the dedicated and joyful service that Jesus showed us, saying “Do this in memory of me”. We pray that our gifts and our energies be transformed into the true Bread of Life for our world in these difficult and troubled times. We pray this in the name of Jesus, who is always present to us. We are Christ for one another, through the power of the Holy Spirit where we live now and forever.
Meditation: A hymn from the writings of Julian of Norwich
There is nothing created in the universe
Nothing great, nothing smaller than the finest grain of sand
That will spend a single moment of its life
Without being held by its Maker in the palm of His hand.
Be it something quite as simple as a hazelnut,
He will hold it in the palm of His hand.
There is no one created in the universe,
Not a king, not a beggar, not a woman, not a man
Who will spend a single moment of life
Without being loved by our Maker, and being guided by Her hand.
As a woman holds the life that grows within her,
We are held in the palm of Her hand.
And all shall be well.
And all shall be well.
Continued next page
And we will touch and we will know for ourselves
That all manner of things shall be well.
For there is nothing that can happen in the universe
From the start to the finish
In the sea or on the land
That is not within the vision of the father,
Of our mother, of our maker and of our lover.
And all shall be well.
And all shall be well.