Gospel: Luke 13:10-17
Jesus was teaching in a synagogue on the Sabbath, and a crippled woman was there. An evil spirit had kept her bent for eighteen years, so that she could not straighten up at all. On seeing her, Jesus called her and said, “Woman, you are freed from your infirmity.” Then he laid his hands upon her, and immediately she was made straight and praised God.
But the ruler of the synagogue was indignant, because Jesus had performed this healing on the Sabbath day, and he said to the people, “There are six days in which to work. Come on those days to be healed, and not on the Sabbath!”
But the Lord replied, “You hypocrites! Everyone of you unties his ox or his donkey on the Sabbath, and leads it out of the barn to give it water. And here you have a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan had bound for eighteen years. Should she not be freed from her bonds on the Sabbath?”
When Jesus said this, all his opponents felt ashamed. But the people rejoiced at the many wonderful things that happened because of him.
Reflection
Christ gives us freedom.
Jesus healed a crippled woman in the synagogue during the Sabbath. For 18 years, it is believed that an evil spirit had kept her bent. One can also surmise that, for those long years, she was marginalized. The woman was freed, through the healing power of Christ, from the evils of marginalization and discrimination. It may have imprisoned her for years, and it was Jesus who gave her freedom from such clutches of social perception. We may also speak of imprisonment in the rigid laws and practices we impose on ourselves and others, forgetting the important law of love and mercy toward others. Again, in this, Christ gives us this freedom. We know we are freed from these clutches when we see ourselves bearing the fruits of kindness, justice, and
truth in every form, as Paul exhorts in the first reading.
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