Description
Imagining the Lectionary: If you want to you can cleanse me (Epiphany 6B)
Reflection accompanying images “If you want to you can cleanse me” and “Hand reaching out to another”
A leper came to him, begging on his knees, "If you want to, you can cleanse me." Deeply moved, Jesus put out his hand, touched him, and said, "I want to. Be clean. (Mark 1:40-41)
Why wouldn't he want to the very thought of being able to help someone in such desperate need and choosing not to is abhorrent to our ethical sensibilities. We are well aware that from a Christian perspective a healthy society is defined by empathy and is reliant upon the daily expression of practical compassion towards those within it who are especially vulnerable and needy. Choosing to ignore the pleas of those who are struggling most, deliberately stereotyping them negatively and defining them as in large measure being to blame for their own predicament, is a woefully enduring characteristic of human social behaviour and one which is always pernicious in its effects and
loathsome in its consequences. Not least when it forms the basis of government policy towards the poor.
Continues...
Reflection accompanying images “If you want to you can cleanse me” and “Hand reaching out to another”
A leper came to him, begging on his knees, "If you want to, you can cleanse me." Deeply moved, Jesus put out his hand, touched him, and said, "I want to. Be clean. (Mark 1:40-41)
Why wouldn't he want to the very thought of being able to help someone in such desperate need and choosing not to is abhorrent to our ethical sensibilities. We are well aware that from a Christian perspective a healthy society is defined by empathy and is reliant upon the daily expression of practical compassion towards those within it who are especially vulnerable and needy. Choosing to ignore the pleas of those who are struggling most, deliberately stereotyping them negatively and defining them as in large measure being to blame for their own predicament, is a woefully enduring characteristic of human social behaviour and one which is always pernicious in its effects and
loathsome in its consequences. Not least when it forms the basis of government policy towards the poor.
Continues...
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