＊＊＊ 1st Reading ＊＊＊    

Isaiah 35:4-7a

 Say to those who are afraid:

 “Have courage, do not fear. See, your God comes, demanding justice. He is the God who rewards, the God who comes to save you.”   Then will the eyes of the blind be opened and the ears of the deaf unsealed.

 Then will the lame leap as a hart and the tongue of the dumb sing and shout. For water will break out in the wilderness and streams gush forth from the desert.  The thirsty ground will become a pool, the arid land springs of water. In the haunts where once reptiles lay, grass will grow with reeds and rushes.

 

Ps 146:7, 8-9, 9-10(1b)

Praise the Lord, my soul!

 

 ＊＊＊ 2nd Reading ＊＊＊

James 2:1-5

 My brothers and sisters, if you truly believe in our glorified Lord, Jesus Christ, you will not discriminate between persons.   Suppose a person enters the synagogue where you are assembled, dressed magnificently and wearing a gold ring; at the same time, a poor person enters dressed in rags.

If you focus your attention on the well-dressed and say, “Come and sit in the best seat,” while to the poor one you say, “Stay standing or else sit down at my feet,”  have you not, in fact, made a distinction between the two? Have you not judged, using a double standard?

Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters, did God not choose the poor of this world to receive the riches of faith and to inherit the kingdom which he has promised to those who love him?

 

＊＊＊＊ Gospel ＊＊＊＊    

Mark 7:31-37

 Again Jesus set out; from the country of Tyre he passed through Sidon and skirting the sea of Galilee he came to the territory of Decapolis.   There a deaf man who also had difficulty in speaking was brought to him. They asked Jesus to lay his hand upon him.

 Jesus took him apart from the crowd, put his fingers into the man’s ears and touched his tongue with spittle.   Then, looking up to heav­en, he groaned and said to him, “Eph­phetha,” that is, “Be open­ed.”

 And his ears were opened, his tongue was loosened, and he began to speak clearly.  Jesus ordered them not to tell anyone, but the more he insisted on this, the more they proclaimed it.  The people were completely astonished and said, “He has done all things well; he makes the deaf hear and the dumb speak.”

 

Gospel Reflection：

 

READ: Jesus is now constantly on the move. In the territory of Decopolis, a deaf person who had difficulty speaking came to Jesus for healing. Taking him apart from the crowd, Jesus made use of the traditional healing technique of the time.

The man is healed and immediately proclaimed it to others despite the prohibition by Jesus not to tell anyone. This elicits admiration and astonishment from all who heard about the miracle.

REFLECT: Jesus’s movements are now limited to the outskirts of Jerusalem. As much as possible he shies away from the center of power. His enemies are on the lookout and they are powerful on their own turf.

So he goes to the peripheries and continues to do his mission. In one of his sorties, a mute man with speech difficulty is brought to him for healing. This man needs others to articulate his request.

That is why friends are necessary to pray and intercede for us to Jesus when we are deafened and rendered incapable of speech by our problems and trials. They will say what we cannot articulate before God because of our situation.

And Jesus responded by healing the deaf and mute man with the traditional form of healing. He could heal the man in countless different ways that would set him apart from other healers, yet he did not. Jesus respects human processes as an expression of his deep Incarnation into human reality.

And so, if the Son of God finds it not beneath his dignity to be human like the rest of us, we too should recover our deep sense of respect for our common humanity.

 RESPOND: There are many people who cannot hear God's voice, or do not have the capacity to pray to God for what they need most. They need accompaniment until they get their spiritual hearing and their spiritual voice back again.

Is there such a person in your circle of relationships. Be his or her ears and voice today. Pray and bring their petitions to God so that God can act on them promptly.