The Rev. Robert Lundquist VI after Epiphany B 2/12/06 St Paul’s, Ft Collins

Have you ever been afraid to touch someone? I clearly remember a moment when I felt that fear. In 1988 I arranged a four-week program for my parish, the topic of which was understanding AIDS. The Church was just beginning to deal with the crisis, and the program created a stir in the congregation. For the fourth week I invited someone involved with ministry to people with AIDS, someone who was living with AIDS. When the moment came to shake his hand, I hesitated for a split second. I’d never before touched someone who I knew to have AIDS. I probably said a quick prayer before grasping his hand. Why? Fear.

In this morning’s Gospel story Jesus touches a leper. The impact of that may very well be lost on our 21^st century ears. The word “leprosy” in scripture takes in a wide variety of skin conditions, and not merely what we know today as Hansen’s Disease, a terrible wasting ailment. According to Leviticus 13 and 14 < - Online Text - > such conditions and disfigurements cause ritual impurity. A leper could not be part of society, but was required to stay at least 50 paces away from those who were pure. Lepers lived outcast from society.

The leper in today’s story breaks the law, breaks social custom, and transgresses all manner of common decency to come before Jesus. “If you choose, you can make me clean.” He doesn’t ask to be healed of the physical ailment, he asks to be made clean. Restored to community. Made pure. Jesus does as he asks, reaching out and touching him. The physical symptoms of the leprosy fall away from him, and Jesus instructs him to go make the sacrifice required by Torah.

Notice that Jesus changes places with him – the leper is made clean and restored to community. But Jesus can no longer enter the towns, but had to live in the countryside. He is outcast; he steps into the lepers shoes. “O Lamb of God, that takest away the sin of the world, have mercy upon us.”

How simple it is, to touch and be touched. And how difficult. We now live in a time of “bad touches.” Of course it was only an illusion before, that all touches were OK. Now we know how many were terrorized by inappropriate contact. And through such programs as “Safeguarding God’s Children” we learn about protecting each other. Our Director of Children’s Ministries Judy Matthews has obtained and placed in our library a new resource, The Swimsuit Book. This is a tool for parents to use in teaching their children about good and bad touches. It is both absolutely necessary and sadly inhibiting, this new attention to our touches.

But we touch at the Peace. Have you noticed where it is that we pass the Peace of Christ? Immediately after our confession of sin and absolution. We are made right with God, forgiven of our sins – and the very next thing we do is reach out to each other in Peace. Before we even have the opportunity to sin again, we greet each other in the Name of the Lord. We are touched in Baptism; we are touched when receiving the Eucharistic bread and wine. Touch is involved in all of the Sacraments, those outward and visible signs of God’s inward and spiritual grace.

It’s a simple act, to touch someone. Jesus uses touch as an instrument of healing in nearly every instance. And we have no record of Jesus ever failing to heal someone who asks. Be clear on this – his mission was to teach and preach about God’s love, God’s presence. Healing seems to be almost incidental. But it is the healing stories that we remember most clearly. The touching simplicity of being made clean, made whole.

Simplicity is God’s way. In the reading from II Kings this morning, we observe Naaman in all of his proud arrogance. Here he is, a great leader, and he is stricken with leprosy. Word comes to him from the lowliest of sources – a newly captive slave girl – that there is a prophet of God who can cure him. So Naaman comes to Elisha, expecting a dramatic healing. Lights, angels, trumpets, fireworks… And then the prophet will not even come out to see him, but sends word that he should wash seven times in the Jordan River. This is unacceptable to Naaman – he demands complexity from God. It is his servants who convince him to do what is simple, and he is made clean. One commentator put it this way: “God left Naaman alone while never leaving his side.” Sounds a lot like parenting, doesn’t it?

You may have noticed the interplay of grace and mercy in this morning’s prayers and readings, in the stories of healing and making clean. It is said that mercy is not getting what you deserve, and that grace is getting what you don’t deserve. Is it true for you? I know it’s very true for me. As much as might wish otherwise, it is in simplicity that the Divine is most present and obvious. The simplicity of both mercy and grace.

Remember God’s simplicity in every moment. Touch one another in love and in healing. Touch one another sacramentally, and by doing so make God present. It is so easy, and so powerful.

Amen.

A Parish For All People!