Friday in the First Week of Ordinary Time, January 12, 2024

Mark 2, 1-12

When Jesus returned to Capernaum after some days, it became known that he was at home. Many gathered together so that there was no longer room for them, not even around the door, and he preached the word to them. They came bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men. Unable to get near Jesus because of the crowd, they opened up the roof above him. After they had broken through, they let down the mat on which the paralytic was lying. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to him, “Child, your sins are forgiven.” Now some of the scribes were sitting there asking themselves, “Why does this man speak that way? He is blaspheming. Who but God alone can forgive sins?” Jesus immediately knew in his mind what they were thinking to themselves, so he said, “Why are you thinking such things in your hearts? Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, pick up your mat and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority to forgive sins on earth” – he said to the paralytic, “I say to you, rise, pick up your mat, and go home.” He rose, picked up his mat at once, and went away in the sight of everyone. They were all astounded and glorified God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this.”

St. Thomas Aquinas posits that most of the events in the life of Jesus described by the first three Gospels took place in the last year or even the last few months of his ministry while St. John devotes much of his Gospel to the first weeks of his ministry, then a few episodes in the second year, and the remainder is spent on the week of his Passion, Death, and Resurrection, with a chapter devoted to appearances of the Risen Christ.  The Gospel Reading for today’s Mass tells us of an event that occurs early in his ministry.  Mark ties the story of the paralytic to the Lord’s healing of the leper with “after some days”, showing the order of the events and also pointing out a connection between them.

“It became known that he was at home.”  The Lord had gone away from Capernaum for “some days” to preach the Gospel, presumably in the country ringing the Sea of Galilee.  Because of the publicity created by the healed leper, the Lord “could not openly go into the city. but was outside in deserted places. And they flocked to him from all sides” (Mark 1, 45).  This suggests a period of at least weeks, which is consonant with the Greek expression “some days” as opposed to “a few days”.  “Many gathered together so that there was no longer room for them, not even around the door.”  His absence stirred up the desire to hear him again, but also reports of his words and deeds while away.  A typical house in Capernaum at the time was surrounded by a wall with a small gate, forming a small courtyard.    This courtyard would have been packed with “many” inhabitants of the town, which boasted a population of 1,500 at the time.  People would also have filled the streets and alleys around the house in order to hear him.  From Mark’s description, the crowd was practically flush up against him.

“They came bringing to him a paralytic carried by four men.”  Probably this man lived some distance away so that he could not reach Jesus the evening he performed so many cures.  “Unable to get near Jesus because of the crowd, they opened up the roof above him. After they had broken through, they let down the mat on which the paralytic was lying.”  Since the four men could not approach Jesus from the front of the house, they must have gone behind it and got up on the roof from there.  Their plan of lowering their friend from the roof was ingenious but not without risk to all of them.  The footing on the roof could not have have generated solid confidence, and safely raising and lowering a man weighing, say, a hundred and forty pounds, would have required a great amount of effort.  Somewhere they procured rope and somehow they fastened it securely to the corners of the mat. Then they took away the roof tiles and slowly lowered the man.  Now, if Jesus was preaching in the doorway, as Mark indicates, the paralytic would have been lowered behind Jesus.  

“When Jesus saw their faith.”  Jesus saw faith that sought him out and toiled with difficulty to come to him.  He saw faith that persevered through what might have seemed insurmountable obstacles.  He saw the faith of men who had not come for their own healing but that of another’s.  He saw real faith.  And he bestowed the reward given to those who believe: “Child, your sins are forgiven.”  Jesus addresses the paralytic as his father, and as a father forgives his son’s previous disobedience to him.  

“He is blaspheming. Who but God alone can forgive sins?”  Either he is blaspheming or he is God.  That is the problem set before the scribes, men who were trained in the Law and who could comment on it as well as draw up contracts and record agreements.  Often they sided with the Pharisees on religious questions.  Now, to this point, Jesus has performed many miracles and preached.  Elijah and Elisha had done the same, centuries before, and they had not attempted to forgive sins.  Surely Jesus of Nazareth did not equal or surpass these great prophets?  But here he is, claiming to do what only God could.  This is how the Lord announces his divinity to the world: in a small town in a negligible country, and not accompanied by visions of angels or with blasts of trumpets but by forgiving sins.  The scribes, however, do not believe he can do that which God reserves to himself, hence the charge of blasphemy.  Jesus pays attention to them though he need not.  He could have cured the man, ignoring the scribes.  But he particularly wants to teach them that he is indeed God: “But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority to forgive sins on earth – he said to the paralytic: I say to you, rise, pick up your mat, and go home.”  And the paralytic does so: “He rose.”  That is, even without Jesus raising him, as he had raised up by the hand Simon’s mother-in-law.  If Jesus had blasphemed, certainly God would not have given him the power to heal a paralytic.  But this meant that Jesus could forgive sins, and if so, then he must be God.  

“They were all astounded and glorified God.”  We modern people have largely lost our ability to be astounded.  We are sometimes surprised, but it is rare that we see or hear something that causes us all at once to question everything we have experienced and believed, with the foundation of our understanding of ourselves and the universe cracking wide open.  But this was the case that day in Capernaum when the people heard Jesus forgive sins as though he were God, and then to see him perform a miracle that confirmed the truth of the forgiveness.  Truly they could say, “We have never seen anything like this.”  They glorified God who had shown his mercy.  Perhaps many of the people present did not understand everything that Jesus had just done, but the cure of the paralytic was clear.  Others, though, understood enough that they could say that they had “never seen anything like this.”  and they wondered what it meant.

Our venial sins are forgiven at Mass and even our mortal sins are forgiven through the Sacrament the Lord instituted for this and which is easily available at Catholic churches.  Let us never forget the tremendous significance of of God’s love we experience in our being forgiven by him.