Ephphatha, Be Open

Dear Brothers and Sisters:

We heard last week from the Letter of St. James, ‘Be doers of the Word, not just listeners, otherwise you are deluding yourselves. Humbly welcome the Word of God for it can save your souls.’  What beautiful and strong words does St. James have for us these past few weeks.

The life of soon-to-be-Saint Junipero Serra is impressive, he stood up for the missions in Mexico and then California because he saw the intense zeal he had when he was younger was deadened with his pre-occupation with studies. Can you and I say something similar: I’m deadened by my job, by my mother, by my worries about money or my health? And so we are not doers of the Word. We pay more attention to rich people or those who can help us or those we like, and the needy ones, like the Syrians and others who are fleeing their country, who cares?

When they refugees arrived in Munich the people generously welcomed them with food and clothing and a place to stay, how impressive! And what about you and me? What would we do?

Perhaps this favoritism that James mentions (James 2:1-4) paying more attention to the well-dressed man with a ring, compared to the one in shabby clothes is more noticed when we suffer because of it. We get slighted and the young, attractive one is favored, we get the short end of the stick at work or at home and the other one does nothing…and we fume. We are no better than the worldly ones. We treat the richer, more attractive person better than the ones we don’t like, even when we are pained when it is done to us.

The Gospel can help us a lot this week. I did not notice at first how Jesus takes this man aside, away from the crowd and the noise, and then he opens his ears. He needs to do the same with you. You always want to be in a crowd, with a lot of noise, so that you can be distracted, can kill time, and Jesus takes you off by yourself, to a quiet place, and then you can hear.

Deaf men always speak in a funny way; he/she cannot correct himself/herself since he/she cannot hear well. Spiritually you and I are the same. Your speech is not so clear, the talk of your life is a bit confused; you send conflicting signals, with bad jokes or a bad attitude. You never speak of God to those around you. As a Christian it would be normal for you to have several people who come to you for some reason or another, and often you don’t. And the readings say it is because the Word of God does not enter you, and change you; you are spiritually deaf. And so your language is unclear, not understandable.

Let the Word of God enter you, for it can save you! Don’t always be with your phone, or the computer, or with a million distractions that exist today. Go off to a quiet place in your house; reflect a few minutes each day. A doer of the Word of God first has to listen to it, in a deep way. Let it enter you, and change you. God will help you and me to be open to what he wants to tell us.

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