Miracles for our tough times

WE cannot deny that we are in very tough times. I am

referring more to the spiritual side of our life than to anything

else. Yes, there are a lot of difficulties in the other aspects, but

it’s in the spiritual and in the field of religion where the toughest

of conditions are met.

            There’s a lot of religious indifference around, affecting

the youth especially, caught in the web of pornography, drugs, etc.

Doctrinal errors, confusion and ignorance are increasing. Immoral

practices proliferate and seem to be the new normal. There’s even a

palpable drift toward hostility to anything that has to do with

religion.

            We know that it’s in the spiritual aspect where the very

core beliefs and attitudes of the people can be found. Once that is in

some kind of crisis, all the other dimensions of life would also be in

crisis.

            And yet in spite of all these, there is still hope. It’s

precisely in these conditions that the greater power of God can be

shown. Yes, it’s the time for miracles. But we have to do our part.

            Like those episodes of the miracles in the gospel, we have

to be as determined as those characters in the gospel who found

themselves in some miserable and helpless state. We have to exert

utmost effort to go to God as soon as we can, without delay. If we

cannot do it ourselves, let us ask others to bring us to him.

            Remember the story of the woman sick for many years with a

haemorrhage. In spite of what she had to go through just to touch the

hem of Christ’s vestment, she just went ahead and got her cure.

            The lame, the paralytic, the blind also did their begging

in spite of unfavourable conditions just to get the attention of

Christ. And yes, they received their cure.

            When they cannot go to Christ himself, their friends

brought them to him. That was the case of the paralytic who was

brought to Christ in a pallet by his friends and even had to bore a

hole on roof for that. The same with Jairus, the synagogue ruler, who

begged for his daughter’s cure. The same with the Syrophoenician woman

who begged for her daughter’s cure.

            We need to do our part also before a miracle can happen.

Of course, Christ can also perform his miracles without being asked.

That was the case of the dead son of a widow. He just let the son rise

to life again when he saw the body carried away for burial. But

normally, we have to do our part, and in fact, to insist on it.

            “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find;

knock and the door will be opened to you,” Christ clearly said.

Nothing is impossible with God. And he is always around and, in fact,

is always solicitous of our needs and actually intervening in our

life.

            We should never lose hope. Let’s implore for miracles for

our very tough times.