Stretch

“If you choose, you can make me clean.” Mark 1:40

Jesus stretched out his hand. 

Two invitations offered. The first by the leper and second by Jesus. 

The leper asked and hoped. Jesus answered and offered.

It was a stretch for both. One was a leper after all.  It was audacious to speak out and ask for healing. He could have been turned down, shunned again. He had nothing to lose and everything to gain.  And Jesus, He stepped out beyond the bounds of cultural norms, to draw the leper back into community, into love. Jesus was radical, but do we ever think about the fact that He also stretched himself? Culturally and religiously, He pushed the boundaries of the time. He touched and associated with a leper, thereby making Himself ritually unclean. This man seeking His healing was an outcast and a sinner, and by mere association Jesus’ character was called into question. Yet Jesus healed him anyway. His love healed the leper and changed the lives of so many.

In his encyclical Fratelli Tutti, Pope Francis writes: ‘Let us dream, then, as a single human family, as fellow travellers sharing the same flesh, as children of the same earth which is our common home, each of us bringing the richness of his or her beliefs and convictions, each of us with his or her own voice, brothers and sisters all.’ (#8)

This dream Pope Francis speaks of, is Jesus’ invitation towards the Kingdom of God. An invitation into a community of love for all. It calls on us to come together, to accept and to reach out in Jesus’ radical love. Pope Francis contextualises this as a radical love for our common home and for each other. This is no easy task. It’s our turn to stretch. To stretch beyond our prejudices and our misconceptions, to stretch out our hands and our hearts in love. 

Invitations have been offered. Will we accept?