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March 5, 2022In today’s Gospel, Jesus is asked “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” Jesus’ answer is memorable: “Those who are healthy do not need a physician, but the sick do.” Jesus easily transgressed social boundaries to reach out to those on the margins and peripheries of society who were in the most need of hope brought by his Gospel.
Several centuries later, our Dominican brother, St. Vincent Ferrer, wrote about his experience reaching out to towns and villages in Europe that had been distanced from the Church for many years and where heresies had taken root, like a sickness. He wrote, “I discovered that a principle reason for heresies and errors in these places was a lack of preaching.” Again, we hear Jesus’s answer, “those who are healthy do not need a physician, but the sick do.”
In our time, those living on the margins who are sick and in need of hope may be sitting right next to us at work or even living in our homes. We have the hope of the Gospel, a medicine with divine power. Do we share it who those who need it? Let us look to the example of Jesus, working with our Dominican brothers and sisters, to preach the Gospel to everyone as the Holy Spirit gives us the opportunity.
