“Through this holy work of Jesus upon the blind man, he received physical sight, but also spiritual sight, namely faith,” Patriarch Daniel of Romania underlined on Sunday at the historic “St George” Chapel of the Patriarchal Residence.
His Beatitude emphasised that through faith, man perceives the presence and work of God in creation and in human life.
“As today’s Gospel shows us, the Lord Jesus Christ is both the Giver of physical sight and the Giver of spiritual sight. We see that the man blind from birth is not only healed, but is also given the power of faith; he believes that the healing was performed by a man sent by God.”
The blind man sent to preach
After anointing his eyes with clay, the blind man was sent by Christ to wash in the Pool of Siloam, which means “sent”.
“Though blind from birth, he went to the pool carried by the power of Christ who had sent him. The One who sent him also accompanied him with His grace so that he might find the pool,” Patriarch Daniel explained.
The blind man drew the attention of those around him, all the more because he had clay on his eyes, and after washing, he began to see. In this way, he became a witness to Christ’s divinity.
“Here we understand the wonderful work or holy pedagogy of the Lord Jesus Christ, who shows us how some disabled or sick people can testify to His divinity and holiness, while other healthy people who consider themselves perfect oppose Him and refuse to recognise the presence and work of God,” His Beatitude said.
The reaction of the Pharisees
The Sunday Gospel also presented the Jews’ reaction upon seeing Jesus Christ heal the blind man on the Sabbath.
“As great as was the joy of this man blind from birth, healed by the merciful love of the Lord Jesus Christ, so great became the envy of the scribes and Pharisees, who murmured against and slandered Jesus because He had performed this miraculous healing on the Sabbath.”
After the healed blind man was rebuked and cast out of the synagogue by the Pharisees, he met again the One who had healed him.
“After first confessing the divine healing power of the man Jesus, the man healed of physical blindness then confesses his faith that the man Jesus is the Son of God and worships Him. The healed blind man becomes a teacher of faith for all suffering people,” Patriarch Daniel stressed.
Unbelief takes many forms
At the end of his homily, the Patriarch highlighted the ways unbelief manifests itself today:
“Atheism or hostility towards religion, nihilism or indifference towards the values of faith, secularisation or the diminishing of spiritual life, even to the point of forgetting God and the Church. People behave as though God did not exist.”
“Yet often people who have gone through suffering and experienced God’s help as liberation from sins and healing from illness grow in faith, which is the spiritual sight of God’s presence and work in human life.”
Patriarch Daniel concluded: “We understand that God can make even a disabled or sick person a teacher of faith, a witness or His messenger in the world to enlighten others.”
Photo: Lumina Newspaper
