What is a Miracle?

 

June 30, 2024

Two types of miraculous healings take place in today’s Gospel reading: the raising to life of the daughter of  Jairus, and the healing of the woman with a continuous haemorrhage.  

What is it about these events or others like them, that make us recognise them as miracles? Usually, when we talk about miracles, we speak of something science-defying or awe-inspiring. But suppose science discovered some explanation for some of our Biblical miracles, - like a geological explanation for the ‘parting of the Red Sea’, or that Jesus had instinctively used or had learnt to use, what we would today call CPR techniques and was therefore able to ‘raise from the dead’ the daughter of Jairus and, in another story, the son of  the widow of Naim? Would we then consider those events as miracles?  For most of us, probably not.

This may seem like a theoretical question, but we will notice that in the two miracles narrated to us in today’s Gospel, there is a necessary element of faith that precedes the miracle. And this requirement of faith, which is of course a mental thing,  is repeated in many other parts of the Gospels.  But today, science has documented the power of the mind in curing several illnesses both physical and mental, and so we could ask whether Jesus’ curing of the sick was just a demonstration of  his ability to use this mental ability, or belief in him, to cure those who came to him.  Would such healings then be considered miracles by us?

Well, if we are focussed on miracles as being science-defying and exhibiting the power of God, then yes, these discoveries would diminish the miraculousness of these events. And yet we do know that many of the things that were considered miraculous in ancient days are today explained by science, - whether it be a sudden darkening of the sun (eclipses) or being allegedly devil possessed and falling down in a frothy fit (epilepsy).  So if  miracles are primarily meant to serve as proof of God’s power through displays of actions that go against science, and so seem magical, then of course we are on shifting sand, because the next scientific discovery may take away a particular miracle from our bag of ‘proofs’ of God’s power.

But what if miracles weren’t meant to be exhibitions of God’s power and glory? What if miracles were just events - normal or extraordinary - that change us so completely, that we are transformed, and as a result become the best we can become? - so that we begin to move away from living lives centred on our own selves and our own needs, and we begin to embrace the entire Universe - i.e. we begin to actively care for those around us, we care for the environment around us, and so on and so forth.  And we may find that when we begin to try to live in this new way, then we are suddenly (miraculously?) offered a scholarship that makes it possible for  us to pursue our passion/vocation, we have a chance meeting with someone that leads us to find our true path, or we are miraculously healed of some sickness and we have an opportunity to do something we feel deeply called to do.  And when that happens, we think that the scholarship or the chance meeting or the healing is the miracle.  But is it? - for it seems to me that the real miracle is the event that initiated a complete change in our way of thinking so powerfully, that we then changed our way of living. And because of this changed way of living, we gradually develop a greater harmony with the world around us, and as a result we may notice that the ‘Universe’, as it were, bent to support us, through that scholarship, that chance meeting or that sudden healing.    

If we look at miracles in this manner, then couldn’t the real miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes not have been so much that they were multiplied to feed 5000, - but rather that when the crowd saw a little boy coming up to Jesus’ disciples to express his willingness to share his little lunch of five loaves and two fish, all the others who had quietly guarded in their bags the little food that they too had brought for themselves, experienced a change of heart and chose to put aside their selfishness and share with those around them -  so that there was finally food for everybody?  I do not claim to know what actually happened there on that hillock where Jesus taught that day,  but would such an explanation of the  multiplication of loaves have been equally a miracle in the minds of all who came that day - or in our own minds?  Perhaps not, because then that would take away from the ‘wonder’ and ‘power’ of the miracle. And yet when Pope Francis preached on this very event in Jesus’ life, he said this: “This is the miracle; rather than the multiplication, it is the sharing”  (Angelus, June 2, 2013).  Of course, Francis does not get into a fruitless debate about whether there was a miraculous multiplication of food or not, but it is clear that he does ask us to focus on the sharing rather than on the multiplication.

The fact is that we are all quite aware that there are thousands of  scientifically mind-boggling things that happen everyday, for which we as yet do not have any explanation, but we do not call them divine miracles, -  because if these miraculous events bring about no change in our hearts, no change in thinking, no change in living, then they are not miracles as Jesus understood them. Because they are not nudging us in the direction that God wants us to move, but are just wondrous events.

Jesus himself was extremely unhappy when he realised that the crowds that followed him came primarily in anticipation of being healed or witnessing some display of power and wonder (very similar to people today who flock to faith healers in the hope of a miracle??) For Jesus, the true miracle happened in the hearts and minds of the people.  And so when the crowds searched for him following the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, he tells them: “Truly, truly, I say to you, you seek me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate of the loaves and were filled” (John 6:26)  In other words, Jesus is pointing out to them that they had not understood the real miracle of sharing that the feeding of the five thousand was a sign of,  but were quite happy in believing that the loaves were multiplied and they got enough to eat.  And the disciples were no better, because later when they were faced with the exact same situation (Mark 8), they still did not know what to do.  And so, after the second multiplication of seven loaves, Jesus upbraids his disciples by first listing out the two stories of the multiplication of bread, and then asking them: Do you not yet understand? (Mark 8:21)

So when Jesus talked about ‘signs’ he was asking his followers to realise what these events pointed to. He was urging people to experience the real miracle of a true metanoia, or change of heart that his miracles were pointing them to.  But, like many of us, the crowds focussed on the magical event, which for them proved that he was the intended Messiah, and so they thronged to him. The pharisees, who did not believe in him and so clearly did not experience a metanoia, demanded that he prove himself to them by showing his power in one way or another.  And to this Jesus responds, “It is only a wicked and adulterous generation that asks for a sign. But none will be given, except the sign of the prophet Jonah.”  The sign of Jonah was nothing else than the miracle of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection.  But the miracle was not to focus only on the rising from the dead, but on the entire process of how his life and death and resurrection changed something in the hearts of so many, both then and down the centuries.  And unless we understand that, we have not understood the miracle or sign that Jesus himself was, - fascinated as we are, distracted as we are,  by the wondrous events that were just a small part of his life.  Which is why after his death, he tells the disciples running away to Emmaus: "How foolish you are, and how slow to believe (Luke 24:25).  They had seen all his miracles, but they had not been able to understand the signs that they were meant to be.

And so, if any of us believe we have experienced a wondrous or surprising event, or what we would call a miracle, in our own lives, perhaps we need to ask ourselves whether that miracle has functioned only as a wondrous event, or whether it has pushed us to live a different more Jesus-like life, and brought us closer to becoming a better version of ourselves, not just a more devotional person. And if it has not, then perhaps Jesus would probably look at us and ask: Do you not yet understand? 

First Reading: Wisdom 1: 13-15; 2: 23-24

Because God did not make death, and he does not delight in the death of the living. For he created all things so that they might exist; the generative forces of the world are wholesome, and there is no destructive poison in them,  and the dominion of Hades is not on earth. For righteousness is immortal, as God created us for incorruption, and made us in the image of his own eternity, but through the devil’s envy death entered the world,  and those who belong to his company experience it.

Second Reading: Second Corinthians 8: 7, 9, 13-15

But since you excel in everything—in faith, in speech, in knowledge, in complete earnestness and in the love we have kindled in you - see that you also excel in this grace of giving. I am not commanding you, but I want to test the sincerity of your love by comparing it with the earnestness of others. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you, through his poverty, might become rich.

And here is my judgment about what is best for you in this matter. Last year you were the first not only to give but also to have the desire to do so.  Now finish the work, so that your eager willingness to do it may be matched by your completion of it, according to your means. For if the willingness is there, the gift is acceptable according to what one has, not according to what one does not have.

Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard pressed, but that there might be equality.  At the present time your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty will supply what you need. The goal is equality, as it is written: “The one who gathered much did not have too much, and the one who gathered little did not have too little.”

 

Gospel: Mark 5: 21-43

When Jesus had again crossed over by boat to the other side of the lake, a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the lake. Then one of the synagogue leaders, named Jairus, came, and when he saw Jesus, he fell at his feet. He pleaded earnestly with him, “My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live.”  So Jesus went with him.

A large crowd followed and pressed around him. And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years.  She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse. When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.”  Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.  

At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who touched my clothes?” “You see the people crowding against you,” his disciples answered, “and yet you can ask, ‘Who touched me?’ ”

But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”

 While Jesus was still speaking, some people came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue leader. “Your daughter is dead,” they said. “Why bother the teacher anymore?”

Overhearing what they said, Jesus told him, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.” He did not let anyone follow him except Peter, James and John the brother of James.  When they came to the home of the synagogue leader, Jesus saw a commotion, with people crying and wailing loudly. He went in and said to them, “Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep.” But they laughed at him.

 After he put them all out, he took the child’s father and mother and the disciples who were with him, and went in where the child was. He took her by the hand and said to her, “Talitha koum!” (which means “Little girl, I say to you, get up!”). Immediately, the girl stood up and began to walk around (she was twelve years old). At this they were completely astonished. He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this, and told them to give her something to eat.