Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time (June 30, 2024)

Today’s Gospel offers us two examples of Jesus reaching out to the poverty of human beings and giving them the richness of life.

Both Jairus and the woman suffering from a blood-flow come to Jesus with great hope and faith and humble themselves before him on their knees. Jesus receives each of them with great gentleness. When he speaks to the woman, he calls her “daughter” and publicly recognizes her as cured by her faith and now restored to cleanness in the community.

Then, Jesus comes to the home of Jairus and takes him and his wife out of the din of the mourners into their daughter’s room. There, Jesus speaks gently to the young woman, takes her by the hand as she is restored to life, and instructs her parents to give her something to eat.

Both the unclean woman and the young girl now share in the richness of life that Jesus gives.

While you and I realize that our God has made us in his image, we also recognize our poverty when left on our own. We have come to know the gracious act of our Lord Jesus Christ: though he was rich, he became poor like us, so that by his poverty we might become rich. By Baptism, we were washed clean and restored to the fullness of God’s life and love. By God’s favor, we have that richness within us.

Each day we share more fully in God’s life here in the Eucharist. Jesus takes us by the hand and walks with us as we journey with him to our Father’s home. He invites us to take the hand of others and share this richness of life together, as sisters and brothers.

Whenever we find ourselves tempted to dwell on our poverty as human beings, Jesus invites us to kneel before him and ask him to touch us with his mercy and love. Jesus will remind us of the riches of healing and redemption that are ours. Then he will take us by the hand and enable us to walk with him as his enriched brothers and sisters.