Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B
July 1, 2012

Reading I: Wisdom 1:13-15; 2:23-24
Responsorial Psalm: 30:2, 4, 5-6, 11, 12, 13
Reading II: 2 Corinthians 8:7, 9, 13-15
Gospel: Mark 5:21-43 or 5:21-24, 35b-43


When Jesus had crossed again in the boat
to the other side,
a large crowd gathered around him, and he stayed close to the sea.
One of the synagogue officials, named Jairus, came forward.
Seeing him he fell at his feet and pleaded earnestly with him, saying,
"My daughter is at the point of death.
Please, come lay your hands on her
that she may get well and live."
He went off with him,
and a large crowd followed him and pressed upon him.

There was a woman afflicted with hemorrhages for twelve years.
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.
She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd
and touched his cloak.
She said, "If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured."
Immediately her flow of blood dried up.
She felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction.
Jesus, aware at once that power had gone out from him,
turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who has touched my clothes?"
But his disciples said to Jesus,
"You see how the crowd is pressing upon you,
and yet you ask, 'Who touched me?'"
And he looked around to see who had done it.
The woman, realizing what had happened to her,
approached in fear and trembling.
She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth.
He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has saved you.
Go in peace and be cured of your affliction."

While he was still speaking,
people from the synagogue official's house arrived and said,
"Your daughter has died; why trouble the teacher any longer?"
Disregarding the message that was reported,
Jesus said to the synagogue official,
"Do not be afraid; just have faith."
He did not allow anyone to accompany him inside
except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James.
When they arrived at the house of the synagogue official,
he caught sight of a commotion,
people weeping and wailing loudly.
So he went in and said to them,
"Why this commotion and weeping?
The child is not dead but asleep."
And they ridiculed him.
Then he put them all out.
He took along the child's father and mother
and those who were with him
and entered the room where the child was.
He took the child by the hand and said to her, "Talitha koum,"
which means, "Little girl, I say to you, arise!"
The girl, a child of twelve, arose immediately and walked around.
At that they were utterly astounded.
He gave strict orders that no one should know this
and said that she should be given something to eat.


This is the story of two people. A woman who has suffered twelve years of pain and debilitating anemia, spending every penny she had chasing after doctors who promised what they could not deliver. In desperation she finds a glimmer of hope in this new teacher. And a young girl who, at 12 years of age, should have been on the threshold of womanhood but instead is at death's door.  Twelve years of wasted effort looking to regain healthy womanhood; twelve years of childhood preparation rendered void and wasted. 

The Spirit is moving to restore woman to health and to undo what would destroy childhood's promise.

The crowds are pressing in, but the Spirit is not to be found in their hysteria. In fact the woman has to push her way through the crush of fans to make her simple gesture of faith.

The Spirit is not in the synagogue, but in the faith of the synagogue official who would go out into the street to find Jesus, and with a gesture of humble petition, squeezed out through desperate concern for his dying daughter, would beg that the rabbi come and lay hands on her so she will not die, but live. So faith is born, and hope is expressed in pleading prayer. 

The Spirit, whom Paul will declare is praying in us when we know not how to pray, is active in those who are pressed hard to their limit.

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After reading the major commentaries currently on Catholica I must direct my thoughts to levels deeper and to perspectives broader than just these two miracles in Mark Ch. 5. The account begins with Jesus coming ashore after what had been a spooky experience in the land of the Gerasenes on the other side of the lake. There they had come upon a man possessed of a thousand demons. The demons chose to take to the pigs, and the pigs took to the sea, and the sea (as one commentator observes) became possessed of another thousand demons to frighten those who sailed upon it. The man himself ends up sitting peacefully on the ground in front of Jesus, and even asking to join his little group; the local people end up filled with fear and begging Jesus to go away. It was an exhausting experience and I fancy Jesus was more than willing to accede to their wishes.

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As they come towards the shore a crowd gathers, a chaotic crush of eager people, fanatical in their curiosity. The rest of the story is easy to read, but what might we find if we dig a little?

There is contrast between the boisterous enthusiasm of the crowd and the quiet determination both of the synagogue official pleading for his dying daughter and of the desperate woman with her incapacitating illness. I am reminded of Elijah hiding in a cave in the desert, waiting on the spirit.

Then the LORD said: Go out and stand on the mountain before the LORD; the LORD will pass by. There was a strong and violent wind rending the mountains and crushing rocks before the LORD—but the LORD was not in the wind; after the wind, an earthquake—but the LORD was not in the earthquake; after the earthquake, fire—but the LORD was not in the fire; after the fire, a light silent sound. When he heard this, Elijah hid his face in his cloak... (1Kg 19:11-13) http://www.usccb.org/bible/1kings/19

Perhaps Mark also was thinking of this scene, for the spirit is not in the turbulent enthusiasm of the crowd, nor in the histrionic wailing of the mourners. The spirit urges the woman forward to express her faith in simply touching Jesus' cloak. Later, in the house of Jairus, Jesus clears out the mourners with their noisy grieving, takes the girl's parents and his three companions, quietly enters the room, takes the girl by the hand, and brakes the silence of death with that gentle command:  "Talitha koum"

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Mark may even be thinking of time before creation: 'The earth hath existed waste and void, and darkness is on the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God fluttering on the face of the waters.' (Gen 1:2)

The poetic image is wonderful. The 'waste and void' in Hebrew reads: tohu w'bohu. Darkness is heavy on the face of the deep. The spirit flutters, in Young's Literal Translation.

May we imagine the spirit of God fluttering gently over the people of this town as the new creation/new covenant takes form. In secret the woman is cured of her debilitating condition. In secret the young girl is raised up. (The three synoptics use this verb egeirein  to express resurrection from death. See Mark 6:14, where people were saying, 'John the Baptist has been raised from the dead.' See also Mark 16:6 where the young man sitting in the empty tomb says to the women: 'He has been raised; he is not here.')

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There is something else, another clue inviting us to dig a little deeper: the woman had suffered from that excessive bleeding for twelve long years, during which time she had wasted all her money on doctors for nothing. Almost as an aside, Mark adds that the little girl was twelve years old. So for the woman, the twelve best years of her life have been waste and void. For the little girl, the twelve years of childhood and development are waste and void as she succumbs to death on the very threshold of womanhood. The same twelve years. I am inclined to wonder if this is not a subtle suggestion that the time of former covenants may be seen as waste and void, almost like what was 'in the beginning', by comparison with what is to come.