Mc 7,31-37 – Friday of the V Week of Ordinary Time
In today’s Gospel page, Jesus meets a man who is deaf and speaks with difficulty, and he does so by taking him aside, away from the crowd. It is a decisive detail, because it reminds us that God does not like to expose our fragilitybut care in discretion. This man is a prisoner of a profound closure: he is unable to listen and he is unable to communicate.
It is the image of many situations in our lives in which we are stuck, incapable of relationships, closed in silence or in the noise that defends us. Jesus does not act in a magical or distant way. Use concrete gestures, touch your ears, tongue, roll your eyes and sigh. That sigh is the sign of a God who gets involved, who feels the weight of evil and sufferingwho does not remain indifferent to our wounds. The word that Jesus pronounces is “Effata”, that is, “Open”. He seems to want to tell us: Open yourself to listening, because without listening there is no love! Open yourself to the word, because without the word there is no communion!
Many times we are deaf not to sounds, but to the people around us, their efforts, their needs. And we are often silent when it comes to saying what really matters: forgiveness, truth, a gesture of tenderness. Jesus comes to give us back this possibility, to free us from the fear of communicating. The healing is immediate, but Jesus asks not to divulge what happened. It is as if he wanted to tell us that the miracle is not a show, but a gift to be cherished. However, when a life is reopened, it becomes difficult to remain silent. Anyone who has experienced authentic healing feels the need to tell. Indeed, it is a side effect of the same miracle of Jesus. Anyone who has had a similar experience cannot remain silent, even if it is Jesus himself who asks for it.
