Readings (Year B):
Wisdom 1: 13-15; 2: 23-24
Psalm 30:2, 4, 5-6, 11, 12, 13
2 Corinthians 8:7, 9, 13-15
Mark 5:21-43
Reflection: The healing power of love
Our reading this week from the Gospel of Mark depicts two parallel miracles by Jesus: one of a twelve-year-old girl who is dying and the other of a woman who has been hemorrhaging for twelve years. From the gospel we learn that the bleeding woman is suffering immensely, with seemingly no hope for a cure. Who is this unnamed woman? How has this pain affected her faith? What is she feeling when she approaches Jesus in the crowd? What do we have in common with her story of fear, suffering, and healing?
According to Jewish purity laws at the time, a person who is bleeding is labeled ritually unclean. Therefore, anyone who touched the bleeding woman was also deemed unclean. For twelve excruciating years, the woman with the uterine hemorrhage suffered alone, bearing the weight of not only physical pain but also the emotional and spiritual pain that comes with being excluded from community. The gospel tells us, “She had suffered greatly at the hands of many doctors and had spent all that she had. Yet she was not helped but only grew worse” (Mark 5:26).
Many of us know women in our lives who suffer from uterine illnesses like hemorrhages, often in silence. What’s worse is that often these illnesses go undiagnosed or mistreated, and women are left suffering while desperately searching for answers. It is easy to feel hopeless amidst chronic pain and to wonder if God is even listening to our cries.
However, we find inspiration and hope in the faith of the bleeding woman and the risk that she takes in touching the cloak of Jesus. Her inner wisdom tells her that if she merely touches his clothes she will be healed, and so she boldly approaches Jesus in a crowd, propelled by the belief that she was made for more than suffering. Instead of rebuking the bleeding woman for touching him, Jesus sees this woman who kneels before him with “fear and trembling” and believes her experience of pain. Imagine the consolation and great relief that the woman must feel when Jesus compassionately looks into her eyes and says, “Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace” (Mark 5:34).
This week’s first reading, from the Book of Wisdom, reminds us that God “does not rejoice in the destruction of the living, for God fashioned all things that they might have being” (Wisdom 1:14). We may not know why we suffer, but this Wisdom passage reminds us that God wishes us to have life, and to have it abundantly. While not all those who suffer will experience a physical cure like the unnamed woman in Mark’s gospel, her story offers us an important lesson: God sees our suffering and is right by our side guiding us toward hope and the healing power of love.
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