Home 
1st Reading: Ezk 47:1-9, 12 / Gospel: Jn 5:1-16
There was a feast of the Jews and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now, by the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem, there is a pool (called Bethzatha in Hebrew) surrounded by five galleries. In these galleries lay a multitude of sick people?blind, lame and paralyzed.
(All were waiting for the water to move, for at times an angel of the Lord would descend into the pool and stir up the water; and the first person to enter after this movement of the water would be healed of whatever disease that person had.)
There was a man who had been sick for thirty-eight years. Jesus saw him, and since he knew how long this man had been lying there, he said to him, ?Do you want to be healed?? And the sick man answered, ?Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is disturbed; so while I am still on my way, another steps down before me.?
Jesus then said to him, ?Stand up, take your mat and walk.? And at once the man was healed, and he took up his mat and walked.
Now that day happened to be the Sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who had just been healed, ?It is the Sabbath and the Law doesn?t allow you to carry your mat.? He answered them, ?The one who healed me said to me: Take up your mat and walk.? They asked him, ?Who is the one who said to you: Take up your mat and walk?? But the sick man had no idea who it was who had cured him, for Jesus had slipped away among the crowd that filled the place.
Afterwards Jesus met him in the Temple court and told him, ?Now you are well; don?t sin again, lest something worse happen to you.? And the man went back and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had healed him. So the Jews persecuted Jesus because he performed healings like that on the Sabbath.
Daily Gospel in the Life Experience
Today?s Gospel reading has a lot to tell us about prayer. In today?s Gospel the sick man rattled off his miseries when he got the chance of talking to Jesus. He used the privileged encounter with Jesus as venue to ventilate his anger towards society. ?Sir,? he said to Jesus, ?I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is disturbed; so while I am still on my way, another steps down before me.? These are complaints of a man absorbed in self pity. The answer to Jesus? question ?do you want to be healed? would have been a simple yes or no. But self-pity paralyzed him from giving the straight-to-the-point reply.
Aren?t our prayers characterized by impatience too? We ask God in prayer that structures change, and that others begin to notice our needs. But there is more to prayer than rattling off. One has to listen to the groaning of his Spirit and to the voice of God. When we listen, we give God the chance to change us each time we pray. And when God succeeds in changing us at prayer, we become partners with God in the realization of our prayer. ? Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM-HRM. Email: dan.delosangeles@gmail.com.
