A Few Words On "The Word"

February 5, 2006
The Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Mark 1: 29-39

Coming In, Throwing Out

What's up with all these demons? Ever since Christmas, the gospel passages from Mark keep talking about Jesus meeting up with people possessed by devils. Was life in that long-ago and far-away place more like Evolution Underworld than now? Hardly. And today's passage suggests why not.

Notice how most of the time Jesus "expels demons," in the context of healing people who are sick. One way of understanding the whole demon-thing is that Jesus' peeps didn't always understand disease, and attributed some symptoms to the devil. This was especially true of epilepsy, for example. People actually thought that someone suffering an epileptic episode was possessed by an evil spirit. Today, with better (but not perfect) medical knowledge, we know better.

So today's passage begins with Jesus healing Simon's (aka Peter) mother-in-law, then moves to other kinds of healing, including throwing out demons. But we would be fooling ourselves if we stopped with the ignorance-of-illness explanation of the devil thing. Cuz we know-don't we?-that there really are devils. OK. They're not the vampires and werewolves of Evolution Underworld. But they are still real. They still afflict people. Some of their names are Poverty, War, Racism, Sexism (and all members of the Discrimination family), Low Self Esteem...The beasts and bloodsuckers of Hollywood are more sexy, more photogenic, more entertaining. But the real demons are all too real.

As baptized followers of Jesus, we're invited by God to do as Jesus did-to expel demons, to free others from the devils that bedevil them. That's what you do as a peacebuilder, btw. By making peace, you heal the sickness of strife and begin to throw the old Liar (who says "Might makes right!") out. But how?

To do as Jesus did, we should do it as Jesus did it. Again, today's passage holds the clue. "Jesus entered the house...he approached, grasped her hand, helped...they brought to him...the whole town was gathered...he went into their synagogues..."

What we need to do is to be present, to be there, to reach out...then the healing happens, then the demons are doomed.

Reflection Question

How can you be present and attentive to someone in your everyday life that is bothered by a demon this week?

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