Was Blind But Now I See!

 

Deacon Dave · Was Blind But Now I See

Homily for the 4th Sunday in Lent (Laetare Sunday), March 30, 2025. Gospel of St. John 9:1-41. Theme: Was Blind But Now I See! 

 Today is “Laetare Sunday”, which translated from the Latin means “Rejoicing Sunday”, and so the usual Lenten color of penitential purple at Mass can be replaced with rosy pink, the color of joy. This custom began in the Middle Ages when the fasting of Lent was very severe and ordinary people didn’t use calendars to mark the passing of time. So the change in color was a visual message that Easter was drawing near. However, there were some who didn’t see it as a joyful sign that the extreme fasting was coming to an end. Instead, it reminded them that they still had three more weeks to go! So you see, as with so many things in life, it's all in how we choose to look at them! 

 And this same dynamic is very much apparent in today’s Gospel. Both the healed man and the Pharisees looked at the one and same Jesus, but they each saw two very different things! The man born blind sees the Son of God setting him free from darkness, while the Pharisees see a threat to their religious position which makes them blind to a divine miracle literally staring them in the face. They only see what they want to see because they have already closed their hearts and minds to the truth that Jesus of Nazareth is the long-hoped for, God-sent Messiah. Admitting this truth would dethrone them from their positions of prestige and authority. And so they remain in darkness. 

 This Gospel is illustrating that there are two kinds of blindness and that the worst is that which is self-chosen, self-inflicted. It’s a progressive spiritual disease suffered by those who focus on themselves, on their own needs, their own desires, and adhere to what they call “their own truth.” If left unchecked this condition gradually progresses into a soul-eating moral disease in which darkness obscures from our view the injustices and suffering of others going on all around us. In short, we lose sight not only of God, but of anything and everyone outside the scope of our self-interest and our self-concerns. This is the deep darkness of which Jesus spoke. 

 But Christ proclaims that He has come into our world as the Light of the world. He dispels this darkness, heals spiritual blindness and opens our eyes through the enlightening grace of Baptism. And this is really the subplot of today’s Gospel, conveyed to us by the story’s use of rich symbolism. The man’s blindness from birth stands for the spiritual darkness that afflicts all of us from the first moment of our lives due to original sin. The mud or clay and then the washing of the blind man’s eyes with water represents the action of Baptism through which we are sacramentally cleansed from the muck of sin and selfishness that muddies our spiritual vision. Through the grace of this Sacrament our eyes are opened and we receive the gift of faith by which we are able to see the deeper reality and the spiritual meaning of so many things that those without faith simply cannot see. For example… 

• We can see that the Church is not only an organized religion or a social institution as it appears on surface level, but is in its deeper reality the Mystical Body of the Risen Christ, an echo of his Voice and an instrument of his Presence in the world today. 
• We can see that the Mass is more than a formalized religious ceremony composed of repeated ritual actions, but is in actuality the saving Death and Resurrection of the Lord somehow transcending time and somehow being made present to us in our worship. 
• We can see that care and concern for the poor and sick is not just a humanitarian work as those without faith see it, but is truly a reaching out and touching of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is mystically present in those who suffer, for He Himself has said that what we do or do not do to them, we do or do not do to Him. 
• We can see that marriage is so much more than just a legal civil ceremony held in a beautiful venue as so many think of it today, but rather it’s a holy sacred union, by which God fuses a couple together into one new entity, forming between them a bond so tight that they become but one flesh that cannot be broken except by death. 
• We can see that the problem of acute chronic pain or of struggling with a severe disability does not have to be defined as meaningless suffering, but instead it can be intentionally united with Christ on the cross, transforming it by faith into a personal participation with Him in His Passion offered for the salvation of souls. 
• And we can see that death is not a gloomy chasm of unknown darkness that brings an end to our existence, but is actually a continuation of our lives, as we transition from our time into eternity, and continue on with our existence but in a new dimension, in a new way, a new mode of being. It's really more like moving and having a change of address. 

 And so you see because of the enlightening gift of faith, given to us at Baptism, we have real reason to rejoice today and every day! Christ our Light has opened the eyes of our souls, which peer so much more keenly into the realities of life than those of the body. We can see the truth and do not have to grope our way through darkness like those without faith. The Light of Christ now shines on us and so we can truly make our own the words of the beloved hymn, Amazing Grace, which proclaim: "I once was lost but now am found, was blind but now I see.”