Day 28: Healing
BY KATLYN TOELLE | March 24, 2020
Today’s Readings
“Do you want to be well?” Jesus asks the sick man on his mat in today’s Gospel, as he waits to be brought to the healing pool of Bethesda.
The sick man answers, though not directly. “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; while I am on my way, someone else gets down there before me.”
I, like the sick man, desperately want to be well. I want to be holy and Christlike, to treat every person I meet according to their God-given dignity. I wish to stand up to injustice much in the way that Jesus did—readily and without fear. I want to rid my heart of every impurity and, perhaps by sheer force of will, heal the sickness in my soul.
But despite my best intentions, I violate human dignity almost daily, harming others by my thoughts, words, and actions. I shy away from uncomfortable conversations, becoming complacent to injustice.
It seems no matter what I do, I cannot make myself well.
Don’t we all fall short of perfection? Aren’t we all dragging ourselves toward the pool of healing—struggling, failing to do it all on our own?
Jesus sees it all: our weakness and futility, our prideful independence. He comes to us in our sickness and offers, quite simply, to make us well again.
When will we learn that it’s not up to us?
I, for one, am tired of inching my way down to the healing waters I know I’ll never reach. I yearn for the day I finally stop looking right and left, comparing myself against my fellow sick people who pass me along the journey.
I am ready to allow Christ to help me “pick up [my] mat and go.”
Katlyn Toelle is the communications manager for Catholic Mobilizing Network, a national organization working to end the death penalty and promote restorative justice. Katlyn holds a B.S. and previously worked with Holy Family Hospital of Bethlehem Foundation. She currently serves as English music director for Shrine of the Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Washington, DC.
Life is a journey. In any journey there can be some wear and tear, with little time for repair. Sages say, we need to entrust our lives to the Lord’s care.
I believe it’s necessary to see Jesus as the “source of living water” what he described to the Samaritan woman at the well in John 4. The man in chapter 5 believed if only he could get into Bethesda, the water near the temple he would be cured. But it was physically impossible. He IS cured by water however! Jesus, the living water through whom all living waters flow heals him.
Amen! You are not alone, Katlyn. Come, Lord Jesus.
The Pool
The sick man at Bethsaida
who could not pull himself into the pool.
How did he get there?
Maybe friends brought him that far. Maybe
he crawled along flat ground. Now
the descent into the pool
is too much.
Will no one help him?
Won’t I?
I will need help, too, in order
to lift and lower him toward
healing.
C L Couch
These are trying times. Yes I do want to be out of this viral challenge and it’s hard to hold Jesus’ hand but I hold on and trust.