Daily Reflection Monday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time

There are times when we may think that all is lost and hope has vanished. Caught in a crisis, sometimes we see no way out and find little reason to continue the journey of life. The two women in today’s gospel illustrate such a situation. The first is a young woman, the daughter of an official who claims she has just died. Yet the man holds out hope that Jesus can revive her. The second is an older woman who had been suffering with a hemorrhage for twelve years. We can imagine that, after all this time, she has exhausted her money and patience on doctors and medicine, and with no success. In a last ditch effort, she dares to touch Jesus, hoping he can heal her. 

For each of these women it appears there is nothing left: there is no hope for their healing. For the people in the crowd milling around the little girl, they were convinced that she was dead and were ready to bury her. And for anyone who watched the woman touch the cloak of Jesus, they would have been scandalized to see a woman with a hemorrhage, touching a man in public with the possibility of rendering him unclean

This is the time when Jesus enters their lives and performs what appears to be impossible. He restores each of them to fullness and good health. It is in such seemingly hopeless situations, when we think that all is lost, that God works a miracle and the Savior is revealed.