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Healing the Brokenhearted
Today’s readings begin with Job lamenting the turn his life has taken. Nothing is right. His nights are restless and troubled. He has endured months of misery and is convinced he will never be happy again.
It is a dramatic story of an upright man, a good and decent man, who lost everything he owned and loved, including his children, and eventually his health. Despite all this pain and suffering he never turned from God. Job was a man who took to heart what we hear from the psalmist: God heals the broken hearted.
How many of us have been in a place that mirrors Job where we feel we might never be happy again? We long for the “good old days” when life was predictable and easier. We lie awake at night thinking over and over about what bothers us most: a marriage that feels broken or a child who has turned away from us, a grandchild in trouble, a job that is ending or a medical diagnosis that is frightening.
No one is without troubles. Suffering is part of being human. Behind so many smiles are the wounds of life. Where do you turn at these times? Who do you reach out to when you have restless nights as Job did?
This week I stood in as grandma for a dear child at her school’s Grandparent’s Day mass. She is attending the same Catholic elementary school some of my children attended. As I looked around the crowded church I recognized people from those elementary school days. I remembered stories we shared, the good days and the sorrowful days. Here we were so many years later around the altar once again in a different capacity praying together.
I know that some of the people I recognized from the past suffered as Job did. It is fair to say that most of us suffered in some way during those years together. Death interrupted our lives, jobs ended as did marriages among other losses. Yet here we were upholding the faith for our grandchildren. It made the psalmists words ring true: God does heal the brokenhearted.
In the gospel we see Jesus’ healing and bringing comfort to his good friend Peter by healing his mother-in-law. With just the touch of his hand the ailment she was suffering from leaves her. Jesus healed the broken worried heart of his friend and then went out into the local villages healing more broken hearts. Jesus, the face of God then and now, teaches us how to be healers.
Our Ignatians West volunteers do what they can to heal broken hearts. They distribute food to families struggling to feed their children. They go into schools to tutor and mentor and bring hope to children and young people. They bring the light of faith in a healing God to people who are ill in the hospital.
In this sometimes crazy, confusing, violent yet beautiful world in which we live we are all called to be the face of God to the broken hearted.
Peace,
Anne
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