Homily

Saturday, March 1 and Sunday, March 2, 2008, fourth Sunday of Lent, Year A
Assumption Grotto Parish, Detroit

Conversion from Spiritual Blindness by the Grace of Jesus the Lord

     Today we read about a man who was cured from blindness (John 9). What we need to consider today is that the Redeemer healed this man not once but twice, and from clay he gave a sign of the new creation which he brought into the world by supernatural grace. And by observing how the Lord handled the case of the man born blind, we may learn how he handles us, who are blinded by sin, in his efforts to save us.

     First let us observe the conduct of Christ. He did seven things: first, he saw the blind man; second, he taught his disciples so that they could understand according to the Holy Spirit; third, he healed the man with clay; fourth, he requested faith from the man he had cured; fifth, he revealed himself as God and Lord; sixth, he gave the healed man faith; and seventh, he condemned those who persisted in the blindness of their pride.

     It is no small matter that he used the earth. “He wished to show that he was the Creator, who in the beginning used clay for the formation of man.”(1) But the power was not in the clay, it was in his fingers and in his word; this is why the clay alone was not enough, but he commanded him to wash. For Christ brought a new creation into the world, and it was the regeneration of the washing not of the waters of Siloam but of Baptism, of which Siloam was but a symbol.

     You will also notice that, in the entire passage, the name of this man is not mentioned once. He is always referred to in periphrasis. Yet I think this is so, because he represents all men. St. Augustine even says that the blind man is the human race.(2) For we are blind, and in every which way. Our eyes see but only a portion of the spectrum of light. We smell very little, unlike so many of the brute animals on the earth. In our touch we are barely sensitive, and in our hearing we are limited as well. Every one of our senses is limited, and some of us use inventions of the modern times to supplant the defects which further limit our limited senses, such as glasses or hearing aids. How little our mind grasps, because of the limitation of our senses.

     But then there is the interior blindness, of a memory which cannot remember what we had for breakfast five days ago, let alone what important things happened to us ten years ago, let alone does it remember the important teachings of the faith, even when we most need them. There is the further interior blindness of an imagination which is the slave of whim, unable to conjure those things most beneficial for our spiritual lives, but always running rampant like a wild thing.

     Worse still is the moral blindness of a will bent down upon the things of this world, instead of the spiritual goods for which God created it. It serves the senses and the passions, when instead of serving them, it should be their lord and king, their master and captain.

     Then worst of all is the blindness of the intellect which has no faith. How prevalent this is today, with men who get great degrees in the universities, and can design cars and jets, the internet and atomic power, who can explore the depths of the seas and the beauty of the outer planets, but yet the same man who does not know himself, nor his God and Creator, nor does he know how to live. Men without faith: these are the truly blind.

     Yet God wishes to do to us what he did with the man born blind, because of his infinite mercy: he wishes to heal our blindness, particularly the blindness of the faith. For not only did he give the man the first sight of the senses, but then the second sight of faith. The man born blind, by the grace of Christ alone, passed through the dark night of the senses and of the soul, and weathered both nights unto his own salvation. This is what the Lord wishes to do with you: so in your purifications, trust him, know that he is saving you and giving you the greatest treasures of his Sacred Heart, namely, the spiritual ones. You therefore need to respond to him with faith, with longing for him, with repentance, even when everything may seem lost. Do not abandon the Lord, for he loves you, and wishes to give you faith, and thereby to bring you into the kingdom of God in this life and in the next.

     So many live according to sin, and not according to faith, like the Pharisees. Jesus called them blind, and declared – horror of things revealed – their condemnation in sin. Better, be like the blind man, and say, “Show me yourself, that I may believe,” and in the darkness of your soul, in the storm of your life, he shall speak from the storm, and give light to your soul. This is the power of the Redeemer, and this is the divine love he has for you, a love opposed to every sin.

     Therefore, let us heed the words of the Apostle,
     “Awake, O sleeper, - referring to the dark blindness of faithlessness -
     and arise from the dead, - meaning the death of sin -
     and Christ will give you light.” (Eph 5:14)
     For he is the light, the only light, the only God, who illumines all men.

     Amen.