Well, here we are again, in the middle of Lent and the time for those long-gospel readings. Last Sunday, it was “The Woman at the Well,” and today it’s “The Man Born Blind.” Next week, those with good memories know it will be “The Raising of Lazarus,” and then, the really long Gospel, “The Passion Story,” itself, we’ll hear on Palm Sunday. But right now, many of you might be wondering what’s my question going to be for today? What strange question will I have about today’s long-gospel story? I’m always surprised by the number of people who ask me before Mass, “Are you preaching today?” and if so, what’s my question going to be. It seems a lot of people want to get a head-start on their answer. Which is fine, by me.
The whole purpose of my asking a so-called “rhetorical question” at the beginning of my homily is to get you involved with the readings for the day. It allows you the chance to settle in, to get prepared for what’s coming. Questions are not always asked to get information, you know. Sometimes when you ask a question, you already know the answer. What you want is confirmation you’re correct. The disciples of Jesus were like that in today’s Gospel story. As they passed by the man born blind, they asked Jesus a question, and they were sure they knew the answer to it. They asked Jesus, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
Their question already contained their answer, or so they thought. Those disciples were positive the man had been born blind because either he, himself, had sinned or his parents had. Of course, they realized the man, himself, was probably not the guilty party. It would have been unlikely he could have committed some great sin against God before he was born, and everyone knew he had been born blind. So, it must have been his parents who had sinned against God. After all, that’s why people were afflicted with things like blindness or lameness or even leprosy. It was always because they had done something really bad, and God was now punishing them.
That’s how it always worked. You did something wrong, and God would zap either you or one of your relatives. Usually, it was the kids who were punished because of the sins of their parents. At least that’s what they believed back then. But Jesus said: no, “neither he nor his parents sinned.” Rather, he was blind in order that he might be healed, and, in this healing, the power of God would be revealed. It was then that Jesus mixed his own spit with the dirt of the ground and anointed the eyes of the man born blind. He then sent the man to a pool to wash the mud from his eyes, while Jesus, himself, disappeared into the crowd. But more questions were asked. First by the neighbors, and then by the Pharisees.
And once again, the ones who asked the questions were sure of the answers they were seeking. They wanted confirmation of their preconceived ideas. The neighbors and those who knew the man were positive he was now someone else! And when he persisted in his answer that he had been blind and now could see, they took him off to the Pharisees to get him to change his answer.
The Pharisees did not like his answer, either. They did not want to believe this man had been cured by someone sent by God, not when they knew this so-called healer had broken the Sabbath. It wasn’t that he had cured someone on the Sabbath, but rather, because he had “worked” on the Sabbath. He had made a mud paste on the day when no such work should be done. The Pharisees believed anyone who would do such a thing could not be sent by God. So, they asked the man’s parents what had happened.
And since the parents did not want to get into trouble, they urged the Pharisees to question the man again. And they did. And he answered them the same way.
He told them the truth, but it was a truth they did not want to hear. What they wanted, what they desired, was for the man to lie. They wanted him to say he had never been blind. And when he refused to say it, they wanted him to agree the man who cured him was a sinner, and that he, himself, must also be a sinner.
To keep in harmony with the community, everyone urged the man to change his story, to change his beliefs. But he refused to lie. He refused to say what everyone expected him to say. He refused to remain blind to the facts. And the others, those who knew him, those who supposedly had been his friends and neighbors, and those who held the respect of the community-establishment, the Pharisees, themselves, they said they knew the truth, that they were not blind.
However, Jesus recognized that, while these people maintained they knew the truth, they were, In reality, not open to seeing the truth when it was set before them. And what about us? Do we see the truth and speak the truth we see and know? Do we speak the truth, even when those around us want us to lie? Do we say what must be said, even when others do not want to hear it?
Not only during this time of Lent, during this time of the long gospels, but each day of the year, we, too, are given the same opportunity as the one given to the man born blind. Although we may have been living in darkness for a long time, perhaps, all of our lives, ever since our birth, we can, nevertheless, encounter Jesus the Christ who opens our eyes to the truth, to the light, itself.
Then, we too, can proclaim this truth. We do not need to go along with those around us, or those above us, with those who want us to persist in our life of lies, our life of darkness, with those who want us to agree with their form of truth, their expectations of what the correct answer should be. Instead, we, too, can recall the words of St Paul to the Ephesians: “You were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live as children of light, for light produces every kind of goodness and righteousness and truth. Awake, o sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.” Amen.
Fourth Sunday of Lent; March 10, 2002
1 Sam 16:1b, 6-7, 10-13a; Eph 5:8-14; Jn 9:1-41