Spirituality for Beginners

Fr. Bede's almost-daily reflections. When it comes to the spiritual life, we're all beginners. I also send these out by email. Contact me at bcamera@anselm.edu. God bless!





Thursday, January 12, 2017

It's your faith that matters

Thursday, January 12, 2017
From today’s Gospel: Four men brought a paralytic on a stretcher to Jesus, but they couldn’t get in the door because the crowd was so great. So they climbed up onto the roof and opened it up until they could lower the mat to the ground in front of Jesus.

Now comes the most encouraging and challenging part of the story: Seeing their faith, (Mark 2:5) Jesus forgave the sins of the paralytic and healed his paralysis.

As you might know, there is much more to the story. Read it in Mark 2:1-12. I just want to emphasize that it was the faith of the four men that sufficed to bring healing and forgiveness to the paralyzed victim they brought to Jesus. The story says nothing about the paralytic’s worthiness or lack thereof, or even if he shared the depth of faith of the other four men.

And so, here in just a few words is a call to we who have faith, a call to intercede for those who cannot pray for themselves, a call to bring to Jesus those who, perhaps through no fault of their own, are paralyzed in any way. Once again we note that it is not a question of worthiness or even a question of faith. How many of us indeed have people in our lives whose faith is very weak or non-existent? Don’t let that be a source of discouragement in your own prayer.

Open the roof. Let the Lord gaze upon your own faith, as imperfect as it may be. Bring the helpless and the hopeless to the Lord in your prayer this very day. And may He, in His time and in His way, bring healing to those who cannot get to Him on their own.


God bless you!

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