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Gospel Reflection for Tuesday, April 1, 2025
Let’s take it step by step. Maybe from the least important to the most. First, let’s point out the intervention of the Jews in this story (in John’s Gospel, the generic term “Jews” refers to the Pharisees mentioned in the other Gospels). They encounter the man Jesus healed after 38 years of illness, carrying his mat, the symbol of his suffering and sickness. And the only thing they can think to say to him is, “Today is the Sabbath, and you’re not allowed to carry your mat.” The statement shows an astonishing narrow-mindedness. They’re standing before a man who has returned to an active life, who is reintegrating into society, and all they can say is that he’s breaking a rule because carrying a load isn’t allowed on the Sabbath. Can you imagine such fixation on minor rules that it blinds them to the wonder of God’s saving, redeeming, and rescuing action? It’s hard for me to think that the Jews’ intervention was out of malice. The Pharisees and other people of that time weren’t evil. They wanted to be faithful to God and keep His law. But by focusing on trivial details, they had lost perspective. They had lost it so much that they couldn’t even rejoice in the good of that man. I hope this doesn’t happen to us! I hope we can rejoice when we see God’s action saving a person, because that’s what matters most to Him: the good of His children. Let’s not get lost in the fulfillment of rules that are sometimes just the product of tradition and culture!
And finally, let’s highlight Jesus’ action. In Him, we see God acting among us. When He approaches the sick man, He doesn’t set conditions. He simply approaches a suffering man, attends to him, accompanies him in his pain, and heals him. He doesn’t tell him he has to convert, follow Him, or go to confession afterward. Nothing. He just heals him. And He pushes him to reenter the flow of life: “Pick up your mat and walk.” Only later, at the end, does He advise him not to sin anymore. But the first thing is to save, to lend a hand, to heal. Without conditions.
The text ends with the Jews still angry. Now because Jesus heals on the Sabbath. Again, they’re caught up in the rules, lost in them. Setting aside what’s most important: the good of the person, which comes above any rule.