Synodality means walking together through life, to be part of the Team, moving along together, comforting one another, really listening to one another. Today I suppose we would call it community or family. God confirms this in the First Reading. I will gather the blind and the lame, … the mothers and those with child; they shall return as an immense throng. They departed in tears, but I will console them and guide them; I will lead them to brooks of water, on a level road, so that none shall stumble. Our loud-longing is heard by God. Blind Bartimaeus in today’s Gospel couldn’t stop calling out to Jesus. “Son of David have pity on me!” The rest of the crowd tried to shush him, He resists the voices that discourage his plea.
He waded through the crowd to Jesus, who asked him “What do you want?” In this case it was obvious. A blind man would want his sight back. Did Jesus miss this? “Master, I want to see.” He already had the incarnate God standing before him, and maybe this was the fullness of what he wanted to “see.” “Your faith has saved you,” Jesus said. And the man saw. And followed. Bartimeus did 3 significant things in this story. He made an act of faith in Jesus but he made an act of faith in him as the Saviour. He called him Son of David, a Messianic title. He was saying in effect: You are my Messiah, you are my Saviour. It was an extraordinary thing for a blind man to see. He had much better sight than many of the people around him.
The second thing he did was, despite being told by the people around him to shut up, he persevered in prayer. “Keep your voice down, you’ll disgrace the whole lot of us. He isn’t going to listen to you anyway”. But the Gospel says ‘he only shouted all the louder’. He gave a marvellous example of perseverance. ‘Ask and it will be given to you’. There was no way he was going to turn down the volume on prayer.
The third significant thing he did was, after he was cured, he didn’t go off like the 9 lepers in the other direction; he followed Jesus down the road. Mark means that he followed in the way of Christian discipleship. He followed Jesus as a disciple for life. The 3 things: he addressed Jesus as the Messiah; he persevered with his request and became a disciple for life.
If Jesus asked you or me, “what do you want,” how would we answer? “Why should we pray when God already knows what we want?” is a question often asked. It is true that God already knows what we need but why then did Bartimaeus have to ask Jesus for help in today’s Gospel? (Mark 10:46-52) Jesus knew everything about people: he knew Judas was going to betray him, he knew about Nathanael under the fig tree (John 1:48), he knew the woman in Samaria had five husbands before her present partner (John 4:18). Jesus knew about this blind man, he didn’t need to be told he needed his sight restored, but yet he asked him what he wanted. Bartimaeus did not need to tell Jesus, but telling Jesus was preparing Bartimaeus’ heart for the gift of having his sight restored. Anyone watching would, no doubt, have thought that it must be obvious that the man wants Jesus to restore his sight but yet Jesus asked him, “What do you want me to do for you.” (Mark 10:51) And when he said, “Master, let me see again,” Jesus cured him. Et Bartimaeus did not just pray to have his sight restored and then disappear. Afterwards Bartimaeus’ whole way of life was such that it revolved around Jesus. “Each one is called by God” we read in the 2nd. Reading.
Our whole life is to be a prayer to God because our whole life is about following Jesus, being a disciple of Jesus, not praying only when we are in a crisis. Prayer is not a magic formula to be recited to bring about the desired results. Prayer is also a way of living, it is following Jesus on the road.
Bartimaeus’ first request was “have mercy on me.” Why did he ask Jesus to have mercy on him before restoring his sight? His deepest need was for spiritual healing, a far deeper need than his need for physical healing. Sometimes we pray for what we want and instead God gives us what we need. What we need is not always what we want but God in his provident mercy gives us what we need. Notice that Jesus said to Bartimaeus, “your faith has saved you.” Bartimaeus was a person of faith. Prayer is to prepare our heart for what God wishes to give us. Prayer is a way of living, it is following Jesus on the road.
Bartmaeus casting off his cloak is a baptismal symbol of discarding the old ways. He kept right on saying over and over, “Son of David have pity on me!” At the invitation of Jesus he rose up and followed Jesus on the way. What must you and I cast off if we are to rise up and follow Jesus? Blindness to the light of Christ comes in many forms…prejudice, refusal to believe, inability to change or to see another’s opinion, seeing only the faults and never affirming others. Do I walk in the light of Christ? Do I radiate his light?
Prayer: Lord, I believe in you as my personal Saviour. Cure me of my spiritual blindness, to see my faults and overcome them, to see the needs of suffering people and respond to them. Help me to persevere in prayer. Help me to believe that you are listening. Don’t let the noisy world shut you out or shut me down. Finally, Lord, help me to be your disciple. Help me to follow you in my journey through life. Help me to follow you down the road. Help me to be another Bartimeus in my journey through life. Amen
Father John Fitzpatrick SAC
(Homily: 30 Sunday B – Given at San Silvestro in Capite, Rome)