GOSPEL MATTERS: Spiritual Light
By Dr Christine Wood, Director of Evangelisation & Catechesis
Have you ever felt that life was meaningless? Was someone angry with you, and you didn’t know why? Has anyone accused you of being judgmental? Have you felt sad and lethargic when faced with religious practices, such as prayer? Do you feel pushed and pulled in different directions?
All of these may be indicators of spiritual blindness, a burden common to us all. When we turn from divine light towards evil, we are left to stumble in a dark meaningless void.
In the Divine Comedy, Dante places fortune-tellers in the eighth circle of hell. Having proudly offered false prophecies of the future, their punishment is to spend eternity with their heads twisted around, forcing them to walk backwards, unable to see where they are going.
In his Pensées, Blaise Pascal reflects on man’s strange condition after sin: “It is certain that man has so fallen from nature that there is in his heart a seed of joy in that very fact.… We run carelessly to the precipice after having veiled our eyes to hinder us from seeing it…. If it be a supernatural blindness to live without seeking to know what we are, it is a terrible blindness to live ill while believing in God. The sensibility of man to trifles, and his insensibility to great things, is the mark of a strange inversion.”
We all recognise deep down that something is broken within us and we can’t fix it ourselves. Pascal writes that we have a vague recollection that, at some distant past, we were once of royal dignity, but have fallen somehow, and are now mere beggars.
The Gospel tells us of Jesus’ healing of Bartimeus from blindness. The name Bartimeus means son of Timeus. The word Timeus comes from the Greek word Timaios, which is derived from the word timē meaning “honour” or “value”.
Although he was socially marginalised due to his blindness, Bartimeus’ name points to his enduring dignity or value – he was made in God’s image. The physical healing of Bartimeus is a sign of his deeper healing from spiritual blindness, which prevented him from following the Lord.
We can see ourselves in Bartimeus. When he was healed, he threw off his cloak and followed Jesus along the way to Jerusalem, to be crucified and rise again. This is a figure of Christian baptism.
Baptism gives enlightenment for our spiritual return to God. The light of faith, given at baptism, renews our minds, giving a new direction to life. The baptised person can declare with the Psalmist, “Your word [O LORD] is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.”
Jesus offers salvation from every form of spiritual blindness. In him there is no darkness – he is the light of the world!