Enter The House

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Feria

Today's Readings:
[ Lam 2:2, 10-14, 18-19; Ps 74:1-8, 17-20; Mt 8:5-17 ] 

The readings today are heavy with grief. Lamentations shows a people sitting in ashes, elders silent on the ground, prophets exposed as false comforters, and a city crying out in the night. Psalm 74 joins the same ache: “Have regard for your covenant.” It is the prayer of people who do not pretend everything is fine.

There is something deeply Franciscan in refusing to look away from suffering. Francis did not meet Christ by escaping the wounds of the world, but by drawing near to them: the leper on the road, the poor at the margins, the crucified Christ speaking from San Damiano. Love did not make him less honest about pain. It made him more honest, because love sees clearly.

Then Matthew gives us Jesus meeting suffering face to face. A centurion comes pleading for his servant. Peter’s mother-in-law lies ill. Many who are possessed or sick are brought to him. Jesus does not offer vague consolation from a distance. He speaks healing. He touches. He enters the house. Matthew says this fulfils the word of Isaiah: “He took our infirmities and bore our diseases.”

That is the heart of the gospel today. God does not merely observe our ruins. In Christ, God enters them. The cry of Lamentations and the plea of the psalm are not ignored; they are gathered into the wounded mercy of Jesus.

Still, healing in Scripture is not just spectacle. It is restoration to communion. The servant is restored to his master’s household. Peter’s mother-in-law rises and serves. The sick are brought back into life with others. Christ’s mercy rebuilds what suffering isolates.

So today, we can pray honestly. We do not need to dress our grief in polite religious language. We can cry out from the ruins, and we can bring others to Jesus in prayer. We can also become, in small Franciscan ways, part of Christ’s healing presence: drawing near, listening well, touching gently, serving humbly.

The world is still full of lament. But Christ still enters the house. And we are called to, as well.

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