Gospel: Luke 13:10-17

 

The Gospel today describes the cure of a woman who was crippled. It is a question of one of the many episodes which Luke narrates in describing the long journey of Jesus toward Jerusalem.

 

Jesus is in the synagogue on a day of rest. He keeps the Law respecting Saturday and participating in the celebration together with his people. Luke tells us that Jesus was teaching. In the Synagogue there was a crippled woman. Luke says that she had a spirit which crippled her and prevented her from straightening up. This was a way in which the people of that time explained sicknesses. The woman does not speak, does not have a name, she does not ask to be cured, she takes no initiative. One is struck by her passivity. It was already eighteen years that she was in that situation.

 

Seeing the woman, Jesus calls her and says to her: “Woman, you are freed from your disability!”. The action of freeing is done by the word, addressed directly to the woman, and through the imposition of the hands. Immediately, she stands up and begins to praise the Lord. There is relation between standing up and praising the Lord. Jesus does things in such a way that the woman stands up, in such a way that she can praise God in the midst of the people meeting in the assembly. Peter’s mother-in-law, once she was cured, she stands up and serves. To praise God is to serve the brothers!

 

The teaching of Jesus confuses his enemies, but the crowds are filled with joy because of the wonderful things that Jesus is doing.