Thursday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 21, 2021

Mark 3:7-12

Jesus withdrew toward the sea with his disciples. A large number of people followed from Galilee and from Judea. Hearing what he was doing, a large number of people came to him also from Jerusalem, from Idumea, from beyond the Jordan, and from the neighborhood of Tyre and Sidon. He told his disciples to have a boat ready for him because of the crowd, so that they would not crush him. He had cured many and, as a result, those who had diseases were pressing upon him to touch him. And whenever unclean spirits saw him they would fall down before him and shout, “You are the Son of God.” He warned them sternly not to make him known.

In the Gospel reading for today’s Mass, we see our High Priest amongst the crowd.  “Holy, innocent, undefiled, separated from sinners, higher than the heavens”, as he is, he yet walks among the sinners, the sick, and those whose only hope is in him.  Not only does he walk among them and speak to them, though he has no need to do this, but he allows them such access to himself that there is danger that they will crush him, and he makes provision for that.  And he heals them.  St. Mark gives us some sense of our Lord’s enormous labor simply by telling of the places where all these people come from: “from Galilee and Judea . . . from Jerusalem, from Idumea, from beyond the Jordan, and from the neighborhood of Tyre and Sidon.”  Not all of these were Jews, but all of them were desperate.  They came to be healed.  “He had cured many and, as a result, those who had diseases were pressing upon him to touch him.”  We can imagine this crowd, “pressing upon him”, grabbing his arms, calling his name, pushing him, each person striving for his attention.  This would have gone on for hours each day.  Our Lord patiently endured it and “cured many”.  That is, he cured all who came to him, and there were “many” who came.  By sunset, he must have been exhausted, with no time to eat or rest.  He spent many days in this way as he moved through Galilee and Judea.  Even before he hung of the Cross for us, our High Priest was offering his sufferings and labors for us.  Each encounter signified his taking on of our flesh.  Each cure acted as a sign of the healing his Death would bring.