Today, 25 May 2014, the Orthodox Christians are on the 6th Sunday after Easter. According to the order of our Church, the evangelical pericope of Saint John 9:1-38 was read during the Divine Liturgy presenting the healing of the man blind born by Jesus Christ, our Lord.
His Beatitude Daniel, Patriarch of Romania delivered a sermon in the chapel of the Patriarchal Cathedral dedicated to Saint Great Martyr George, in which he showed that the gospel of the 6th Sunday after Easter, also named the Blind Man’s Sunday, continues the series of the Gospels during the period after the Holy Easter which presents several healings done by Jesus Christ, our Saviour, so that we should understand His saving life giving power.
The lack of faith or spiritual blindness is more serious than the body’s blindness.
Then, His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel emphasised the spiritual significance of the evangelical pericope: “Today’s gospel shows us that the spiritual blindness is more serious than the physical or bodily blindness. The Gospel of the Blind Man’s Sunday makes a striking contrast between the light that Jesus Christ, our Saviour, gives to this man blind born, making him see, and the dark envy of the Pharisees who did not love Jesus when He healed the sick. The purpose of today’s Gospel is to show that sometimes it is easier for the blind born humans to believe in and witness Christ, than those who although can see with their physical eyes, they do not believe in Him. The gospel shows us that the lack of faith or spiritual blindness is more serious than the physical blindness, and that it is easier to heal the body’s blindness than the spiritual blindness of the lack of faith. The blind man that today’s gospel writes about has not asked anybody to heal him. He was only noticed by Jesus Christ, our Saviour, and by his disciples who asked Him if that man was blind because he or his parents sinned. Jesus, our Lord, said that neither he nor his parents sinned, but he was born blind to show the work of God”.
His Beatitude emphasised the fact that the healing of this blind man showed the work of God, namely that Jesus Christ, the Son of God is the Creator of the world: “Jesus also says that there are people who suffer not because of their own sins or of their parents, but because they must show the work of God. It is the work of healing and changing, or of renewal of the human life. The haling of this blind man showed the work of God, namely that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is the Creator of the world, who created man at the beginning of the world together with the Father and the Holy Spirit; and that He is the light of the world, namely the ultimate sense of life, of the existence of the universe and of humankind; and that He is the One who gives physical sight as well as spiritual sight which is the faith. He is the source of the light visible with the physical eyes and of the light seen only with the spiritual eyes, of the faith. The Son of God heals the human nature when it becomes cripple. Jesus Christ, our Lord, spat on the ground and made mud with which rubbed the blind man’s eyes. His gesture shows that because He is the Son and Word of God who bowed down and took up dust when He made the world, made a man and blew life into him, He can remake the human nature which has become cripple, helpless and suffering.
“Today’s Gospel shows us how a man born blind could see and witness Christ, while some of the Pharisees who could see remained in their spiritual blindness refusing to believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Therefore, we see that God can turn a cripple man into a teacher of His in the world. We see how great the love of God is and how great the work of God in the human is.
