Fourth
Sunday of Lent (A) [Jn 9:1-41]
15.03.2026
Jesus
is the Healer of Spiritual Blindness
- Theme in brief:
Healing
of our spiritual blindness
- Focus Statement:
Physical blindness is not caused by
sin, but spiritual blindness is; due to which we are not able to see our sins
and who Jesus is.
- Explanation of
the text
Today’s
gospel passage is about the healing of the man who was born blind, and the
non-healing of the Jewish religious leaders who continued to remain in their
blindness. Of course, the gospel speaks about the incurable spiritual blindness
of the Pharisees. Jesus is the light of the world (9:5). As light he has come
into the darkness
of this world. Only by admitting one’s own spiritual blindness one can
approach the light of God that shines in the person of Jesus. This text dramatically
explains how the light of Jesus gives spiritual sight to the man born blind, and
blindness to those refuse to accept that light by thinking that they
know or see everything. It proclaims Christ as the light that dispels darkness
of sin and reveals
the Father’s love.
The
story of the born blind man narrated in the given text begins with a question
asked by Jesus’ disciples about who is responsible for his illness (9:2). It
proceeds to assert that physical blindness is caused neither by one’s personal
sins nor one’s parents' (9:3), and ends with the conclusion that spiritual blindness
is surely caused by one’s sins (9:41).
In other words, sin is the spiritual blindness that needs to be healed
much more than physical blindness. Jesus corrects a commonly held wrong belief
of people of his time, also found in the OT (Ex 20:5), that sickness is caused
by one’s own sins or the sins of one’s parents/ancestors. Though the OT teaches
that sickness and other sufferings have come into human life due to the sin of
our first parents, in the light of Jesus’ teachings we need to understand that they
are not the result of one’s personal sins, but the consequence of the sin of humanity
as a whole. Otherwise, what we get is a punishing and revengeful God who sends
sickness to punish us for our personal sins. From what Jesus says we understand
that sickness or any human suffering is an occasion to “reveal God’s works” (9:3) – his
mercy, love and glory. By giving sight to the blind man, Jesus does reveal
God’s works of mercy and salvation to an afflicted or suffering person.
The
procedure with which Jesus healed the blind man is also filled with symbolic
meanings. First he applies a paste of mud prepared out of his saliva and asks
him to go and wash in the pool of Siloam (9:6). The former symbolizes baptismal
anointing
(done in the early Church and continued till today) and the latter baptismal washing
with water. The very fact that Jesus asked him to wash in the pool of Siloam
(9:7) instead of healing him on the spot, indicates two things: (1) he is
presented here as a faithful disciple who obeys what the Master commands; (2) the
name of the pool ‘Siloam’ (which means Sent, 9:7), symbolizes an inner washing -- of sins by the water
of baptism by which a disciple becomes ‘one who is sent’ or a missionary.
Jesus
opens not only the blind man’s physical eyes, but also his eyes of faith to
recognize his real
identity stage by stage, deeper and deeper. At first, the blind man
knows him only as a man called Jesus (9:11), then as a prophet
(9:17), later on as a man from God (9:33), and finally as the heavenly
and divine person, Son of Man (9:35). His faith culminates in an act
of worship
of Jesus as the
Lord by making the shortest and simplest confession of faith: “Lord,
I believe” (9:38). He becomes a model for us for making a progress from ignorance
of Jesus to
confession of faith in him and boldly bearing witness to him, whereas his
neighbours continue to remain in ignorance (9: 8-12); his parents fail to
confess Jesus publicly out of fear of excommunication (9:23); and the Pharisees
obstinately
refuse to accept or admit the truth in spite of seeing it with their
eyes (9:24, 40). Thus, this text highlights the movement of a would-be disciple from
unbelief
to belief,
ignorance to knowledge of Christ, blindness to the light of faith, and superficial
faith to the depth of faith-surrender.
The
healing of the blind man is only a sign of the spiritual light which Jesus has come
to give to those who are spiritually blind. This story begins with a man born
blind presumably due to his or his parents’ sins (9:2) and ends with some of
the Pharisees, presumably righteous ones, pronounced sinners by Jesus because
they pretend to “see” (9:39-41). At the end, the blind man not only receives
physical sight but also spiritual light. Thus, the story ends with the paradox and
a double meaning common in John’s gospel – those who are blind see and those
who think they can see are blind (9:39).
- Application to
life
Today’s’
gospel brings to light the inner journey of a blind man who is lost in
darkness from birth and is condemned to beg with no hope for the future. The
day he encounters Jesus and obediently follows his directions, his life changes
and he becomes an ardent disciple.
The
introductory part of today’s gospel that deals with the question whether
sickness is the punishment
for our or our ancestors’ sins, is relevant even today. This view is
held not only by many people of other faiths, but also by some popular preachers
in the Church. Though we find such a
view in the OT, Jesus purifies that understanding by revealing to us the image
of not a punishing/revengeful God, but a boundlessly loving and compassionate Father. Far from
being a punishment for our personal sins, our sickness or any other sufferings provide
an opportunity or occasion for repentance for our sins and bearing witness
to Christ’s own suffering. If we accept them with a deeper faith, he gives us supernatural
strength to bear them. For Christian disciples, it is impossible to negate the
glory of God shining through a person who has accepted his/her illness with serenity
and has joined it to Christ’s own suffering. In this Season of Lent, we need to
re-discover the meaning
of human suffering in the light of Christ’s suffering. That is why,
instead of asking who/what is the cause of our suffering, it is proper to ask what
could be God’s
purpose in allowing me or so-and-so to suffer so much.
Let us
go to the main message of this story: By human nature, we are all born spiritually
blind. Baptism is our first cure for spiritual blindness. Through
the water of baptism, God opened our eyes of faith, washed our sins and gave us the
light of
faith to ‘see’ Christ. Lent is a time to renew our baptismal
commitment, a time to admit that we repeatedly become spiritually
blind. We have to examine ourselves and see how seriously we are preparing
ourselves to renew our baptismal grace and wash our inner selves once again with the
baptismal water at Easter Vigil. At Easter we want to ‘see’ the Risen Christ in
faith and acclaim, “Lord, I do believe” (9:38). Let us examine
ourselves on three matters by following the model of the blind man: (1) How obedient
disciples we are in following Christ; (2) how faithful we are to the mission for
which we are sent by baptism (remember the meaning of ‘Siloam’); and (3) how
boldly we bear witness
to Christ and his values like the blind man who was willing to face
excommunication from the synagogue for the sake of his faith. Like him, can we
make a bold confession of faith: "One thing I do know, that though I was
blind, now I see” (9:25).
What is spiritual blindness? Spiritual Blindness is a common biblical metaphor for the inability
of a person to understand or grasp a spiritual truth or its true meaning. Physically
blind people cannot see visible things like colours, whereas the spiritually
blind cannot see invisible spiritual realities such as God’s grace, love, peace
and forgiveness. We notice a great sense of humility and openness in the blind man who
admits his need for getting both physical sight and spiritual insight into the person of
Jesus. On the other and the Pharisees insist that they
see everything clearly without any light from God to see who Jesus is and also
how weak in spirit they are. Can we recognize a Pharisee in us?
We can become spiritually
blind in many other ways such as: (1) by judging
people merely on their external appearance without knowing their internal
motives; (2) by not seeing our own sins, weaknesses, limitations and failures
and justifying our misbehaviour, instead of accepting it; (3) by always
pointing out at others’ wrongdoings and closing our eyes on our own; (4) by
claiming to have committed no murder, but ‘killing’ (deeply hurting) people
with our heart-piercing words and abusive language or harsh judgements; (5) by
saying we have never committed adultery, but continuing to nurse lustful
attachments towards so-called special
“friends”; (6) by allowing money, power and position to blind us; (7) by our
inability to see the hand of God behind our sorrows and hardships, or to see
any good behind our sufferings; (8) by our inability to see the needs,
difficulties and suffering of others; (9) by refusing to see the disastrous
effects of racism, casteism, communalism, groupism, terrorism and many other
‘isms’; and (10) by not seeing the root
cause of wars, crimes, corruption and many other ills and social evils of our
world. Is it not sin or selfishness of human heart, which perpetrates these evils or masterminds them?
Do we see how we directly or indirectly contribute to some of these and other
life-negating forces in the world? Ultimately, our blindness is the blindness of
faith, because of which we are not able to see the love of God (even
in adverse situations) or our need of him, and are not able to respond to it.
What are the
causes of spiritual blindness? From today’s gospel, we can point out
three causes: (1) ignorance;
(2) doubt and negativity;
and (3) hardheartedness.
First of all, if we do not
open our minds to know and learn the truth we will never know it. We
get spiritual sight when we are open to the truth. See the type of question the disciples asked:
“Who sinned?” They were very sure that somebody had sinned, either he or his
parents, for him to be born blind. There is a sharp contrast between the
blind man who admits his ignorance, and the Pharisees who are sure of their
knowledge. Like them
sometimes we too are very sure of worldly knowledge such as computer science,
information technology, and sensational stories about the private life of our
neighbours/ friends/ enemies, but are ignorant of the Scriptures, of God’s ways
and of mysteries of our own life. Secondly, like the
Pharisee who doubted everything,
we too approach divine intervention in our or somebody else’s life purely on
human reasoning. The Pharisees first doubted about the identity of the healed
man, secondly about the divine powers of Jesus to restore sight because they
considered him a sinner. Is it not true that our own attitudes, speech and
behaviour that border on so much of cynicism, sarcasm, pessimism and negativity
block God’s grace – even that grace which flows down throw the good example and
guidance of others? .
Thirdly, like the Pharisees those
who are not open to God or become hardhearted are incurable. We can become
hardhearted in several ways such as refusal to admit our sins or worst still
justifying them, holding on to our past grudges and refusing to forgive
people…. The worst sin of modern times is to lose the sense
of sin and to say that there is no such thing as sin even after
committing worst of crimes. In other places of the gospel, Jesus calls this
kind of hardheartedness an unforgivable blasphemy against the Holy Spirit
(e.g. Mk 3:28-29), since such persons never yield to the promptings of the Holy
Spirit to admit their sinfulness and need for God’s grace till the end of their
lives. It is impossible to save those who refuse to
admit that they are ‘blind’ (that is, sinners) till the end of their life, and
are in need of God’s grace and redemption. Like the Pharisees, they will remain
in sin (9:41). Only those who remain open to the truth about themselves and see
how sin truly blinds them can receive the light of faith.
This story highlights our need
to have our own spiritual blindness healed, especially in this Lenten Season,
by turning to Christ, the light of the world. We need
to plead Jesus to open our eyes to the truth about our need for admitting our
sins, for repentance,
for forgiveness
and salvation.
It is up to us to decide or make a choice: either to see the truth and get rid of
our spiritual blindness, or like the Pharisees to harden our hearts and
stubbornly refuse to accept the truth. The more we progress in faith the more
we see our inadequacy
and need to be open to God’s light.
- Response to God's Word
Do we
habitually point out others’ faults and justify our own wrongdoings and other
evils of the world under various pretexts? What are we doing to get healed from
ay of the spiritual blindness mentioned above? To what extent ignorance of
truth, negativity and hardheartedness cause spiritual blindness in us? How are
we making progress in our faith and growing in spiritual knowledge and deeper insight
during this Lent? Like the blind man, let us admit our helplessness to get rid
of our spiritual blindness and the darkness of sin on our own, and put our
trust in Jesus who alone can anoint us with the power of his Spirit.
- A prayer
Lord,
reveal to me your purpose in allowing me and those dear to me sometimes to
suffer so much. Reveal to me my present spiritual blindness and give me the
humility to admit it. Open the eyes of my faith, and give me the light to ‘see’
you in all situations. Wash me with your cleansing water and deepen my faith. Grant
that I may be your obedient and faithful disciple by fulfilling my baptismal
mission of bearing a bold testimony to you. Amen.
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