Sunday 5 February 2006

Next Saturday is the Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, which I hope to have the privilege of celebrating in Lourdes. On that day every year the Church celebrates the World Day of the Sick. The main celebration this year will take place in Adelaide in Australia. The special focus this year will be on mental illness and the effects of loneliness and depression.

In his message for the celebration, the Holy Father points out the many forms of stress that afflict people today, wars and terrorism, hunger and deprivation. In the affluent world there is loneliness, the breakdown of families. The pursuit of prosperity can lead to the neglect of those, like the sick and elderly who are not seen as making a contribution to economic well being. That is why the World Day for the Sick is important – it focuses our attention on those who are sometimes not properly valued in the bustle of modern living.

So the World Day for the Sick directs the attention of the whole Church, as it does every year, to all those who are ill, whether in hospitals or at home, and to all who care for them. That was why I was anxious to come here this Sunday to celebrate Mass with you in the Regional.

The first reading shows us Job reflecting about his situation; he has suffered in every possible way, loss of his property, ill health and pain, and bereavement,. He is full of grief and disillusionment and he is struggling to find meaning and hope.

Here in a hospital we can sympathise with Job. We are in touch with suffering and anxiety; some patients’ lives have very unexpectedly been turned upside down by illness, some are coping with ongoing weakness and suffering, some have realised how uncertain our expectations can be; some are learning that life is fragile and precious in a way they never experienced before.

In today’s Gospel we see illness and weakness being transformed. Peter’s mother in law was in bed with fever, but when she met Jesus, the fever left her and she began to wait on him and on his disciples.

There are two transformations in that story. One is the obvious one: that the fever left her. But the other, maybe more important, transformation is that someone who felt helpless became active, and began to welcome and to serve her guests.

There is marvellous work done in this hospital in overcoming fevers and diseases and problems of all kinds. We give thanks for the many ways the hospital brings healing and for the people who work so dedicatedly to cure and care for those who are sick. But we should also think about the other transformation.

We are all meant to serve one another, to love one another as Jesus loves us. We can do that in every situation. One of the worst things about a society, which is so focused on earning and productivity and well being, is that it can make people who are ill feel helpless, unwanted and a burden.

The second transformation teaches us that this is not so. That transformation from helplessness to service of others does not have to wait until a person is cured. In fact, people who are sick have a vital contribution to make to the rest of us. The prayers and the faith and the example of courage and patience and hope that sick people so often offer, the appreciation they show to their families and friends and to those who help them is worth more than they will ever know. They teach us a lesson that we need to learn – that there are more important things in life than our plans and our achievements and our busy-ness and bustle.

The World Day of the Sick says to those who are sick: ‘You are not helpless; you are not a burden; you are at the heart of the Church. We believe that the goal of every human life is to pass with Christ through suffering and death into the glory for which we all long. Your suffering brings you closer to Christ in that journey. We look to you with love and we accompany you by our prayers. That was the message of Pope Benedict to all who are sick:

I would now like to address you, dear brothers and sisters, tried by illness, to invite you to offer your condition of suffering, together with Christ, to the Father, certain that every trial accepted with resignation is meritorious and draws divine goodness upon the whole of humanity.

+Donal Murray
Bishop of Limerick