+"EPHPHATHA, BE OPENED!" 23 rd. Sunday
Ord. B
Last Sunday we were invited by the gospel to reflect on our hearts for it is not
that which come from without into us that defiles us but what comes from within.
Today, let me suggest, we are again invited to look within, look at those powers
of perception in us yet in need of grace, in need of the Christ life we are
about to celebrate and receive at this altar. When Isaiah tells of the blind
having their eyes opened, the ears of the deaf being cleared, the lame leaping
like a stag, the mute singing for joy, the prophet is addressing you and me in
those areas of our lives still opening up to Christ’s transforming love. It is a
transformation that all of creation awaits so as to share in the revealing of
the children of God..
The gospel taking up a similar theme, presents us with one who is both deaf and
dumb but wonderfully healed amid the dramatic action and words of Jesus. One
approach to this text is to recognize ourselves in the deafness of this man
begging that he might hear, recognizing ourselves in his speech impediment, that
our tongues too may be loosed so as to proclaim the wonderful works of God. It
is a matter of letting ourselves move into that space where all of life is God’s
gift, of letting ourselves move into that space where our ears are being opened
so as to hear the Word in all its creative power, into that space where we know
just how intimately God is involved in each of our lives. Jesus putting his
finger into the man’s ears, spitting so as to touch the man’s tongue with his
saliva, and saying: “Ephphatha, be opened!” he is doing amid the very
circumstances of each of our lives so that his words may reverberate through the
whole of our being, jar awake all the faculties of our hearts, opening them to
all their spiritual potential.
When Jesus did this, we are told he took the man “off by himself away from the
crowd.” What Jesus wishes to accomplish in us is not something he likes to be
exposed to the vain curiosity and vulgarity of the public view. What draws monks
to an enclosed way of life, hermits or hermitesses to their solitude is the
intimacy of this exchange. Or as is commonly said: “You don’t make love in
public.” What Christ calls the Christian and every monk or nun to, is a life
hidden with him in God, not another commercial in the entertainment world.
The reading from St James gives us a reality check on just how well this inner
transformation is taking place in us, how well our hearts are seeing, our ears
hearing. It tells us that as long we make distinctions in our treatment of rich
and poor, as long as we discriminate in any way against the less fortunate of
our society or community, we are blind, deaf and lame. For God chooses those who
are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom promised to
those who truly love.
Mother Theresa use to share an experience that brought all this home to her.
Some time ago a gentleman had come to her and said ‘There is a Hindu family with
eight children that have not eaten for some time. Kindly go and see them.’ I
took rice with me and I went, and when I arrived I could see the children’s
faces shining with hunger. I gave the rice to their mother. She divided it into
two and went out.
When she came back I asked: ‘Where did you go and
what did you do?’ And the only answer she gave me was ‘They are hungry also.’
‘Who are they? I asked.
She said: ‘A Muslim family next door.’
‘I was struck very much,’ Mother Theresa goes on
to say, ‘not so much by what she did as by the fact she knew they were hungry;
that she saw their hunger, she felt their hunger and therefore she had the
courage to share with them.’ If only the eyes of our hearts may be open enough,
as this woman’s were, to see the hunger around us, to hear the groans of so many
lonely poor and imprisoned. Then our steps too would readily serve them; our
tongues speak those words of comfort and love so needed in our world.
Through the liturgy of the Word Christ is even now putting his finger into our
ears and opening them to the power of his liberating word. In the Eucharist He
is touching our tongues not only with a healing saliva but this with his own
very Body and Blood, opening our hearts to a divine life that is eternal. May we
hear him saying deep within each of us, within our families and community:
“Ephphatha, be opened!”
Michael Casagram, OCSO
Abbey of Gethsemani
September 10, 2005
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