In terms of using the five senses analogously as means for spiritual communication, the sense of touch probably comes in third. The two senses that seem to come in first and second are hearing and sight. The Gospels and the letters of St. Paul remind us over and over again that faith comes through hearing. The psalms pray for the ability to see God face to face. Other passages in the Hebrew Scriptures emphasize that God is usually seen in fire as in the story of Moses and the burning bush, or in lightning accompanied by peals of thunder as in the story of Moses on the heights of Mt. Sinai.
The Gospel today, however, puts the emphasis on the sense of touch. Jairus pleads with Jesus to come to his house and lay hands on his daughter who is at the point of death. The woman with a hemorrhage seeks to touch the cloak of Jesus. There is something about touch that figures in healing.
Little children demonstrate this to us over and over. When they scrape a knee or get a bump on the head, they immediately run to their mother or father and, with copious tears, beg for them to take the pain away with a kiss. Kissing a boo-boo doesn’t help the pain at all. But usually the tears dry up because the kiss heals the pain that is in their hearts. Kissing helps the loneliness that seems to accompany physical pain. Pain and loneliness are companions. This would have been a very large part of the woman’s pain as she was cut off from family and friends by the law of Moses.
Adults tend to hide their pain. We try to play it safe and don’t tell others when we are hurting. Even when others ask, we tend to minimize our pain. In the process we isolate ourselves from the human companionship that is so necessary. This is especially so among the grieving. Rather than display our pain with all its rawness, we tend to cover it up. So Jairus and the unnamed woman of the Gospel offer us a lesson in experiencing healing.
When we see someone in pain, we might offer them words of comfort. However, touching the person in pain seems to be far more effective. It has the capacity to bridge the separateness and create a non-abandoning sense of presence. If you have ever had someone hold your hand while confined to a hospital bed, you know the comfort that Jesus must have brought to those who came to him for healing. Jesus is often a touchy-feely kind of healer. This is all the more remarkable because touching in the Middle Eastern culture of Judaism could make you unclean and force you to separate yourself from family and friends alike.
The Gospel today is very clear that the woman who touched the hem of Jesus’ garment was filled with fear and trembling when she was discovered. Jesus knew immediately that power had gone out from him, causing him to turn and look for the person who had touched him. This woman, considered unclean or ritually impure, had passed her isolation on to Jesus by her touch. Yet when Jesus saw the fear in the woman’s eyes, he told her, “Daughter, your faith has saved you.”
When Jesus arrives at the home of Jairus, he learns that the girl is dead. Touching a corpse also rendered a person as unclean. The crowd dismisses the need for Jesus to intervene and ridicules him when he says that the girl is simply sleeping. They lack the faith that was present in the hemorrhaging woman. As a result Jesus does not let them see what he is about to do. Only the girl’s parents and three of the apostles were allowed in the room with him.
In both instances, Jesus also uses endearing terms when addressing these two. He refers to the woman as “Daughter,” and calls out to the little girl. The interior disposition of Jesus is his awareness of himself as God’s Beloved who expresses and communicates divine love. God’s love is what stems the flow of blood in the woman and causes the blood of the little girl to flow again. God’s love emanates from Jesus and causes a woman who is spiritually dead and a girl who is physically dead to live again. In both cases, Jesus’ human touch communicated divine care and inclusion. The isolated person is no longer alone and, here the mystery deepens, unexplainably safe.
It is this Jesus who wishes to touch us today in the Eucharist. When the body and blood of Jesus touch our hands or our tongues, it the healing touch of Jesus that kisses away the pain of our isolation. How blessed we are to experience this touch. We cry out with the psalmist, “I will praise you, Lord, for you have rescued me.”
Fr. Lawrence Jagdfeld, O.F.M., Administrator