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Dear Parish Faithful,
Christ is Risen! Indeed He is Risen!
Paschal Meditation - Day Thirty Seven
"Healing a person blind from birth was indeed an act of creation, not simply a repair. Contemporary medical science knows more clearly how difficult it would be than was known in the first century. When a boy is born, he can only see far enough to behold his mother's face when held in her arms. It will take several years of practice for him to learn to use his eyes, to make the connections among nerves and his brain that will enable him to see well. Medical technology is working on building an artificial eye that would enable a blind person to see at least light and darkness. This might work for one who lost vision in adulthood, but not for one who was blind, who never developed the infrastructure of nerves for seeing in the first place. Indeed, Chrysostom in his own way hints at these facts:
"'Furthermore, not only did [Christ] fashion eyes, not only did He open them, but He also endowed them with power to see. And this is a proof that He also breathed life into them. Indeed, if this vital principle should not operate, even if the eye were sound, it could never see anything. And so he both bestowed the power to see by giving the eyes life, and also gave the organ of sight completely equipped with arteries, and nerves, and veins, and blood, and all the other things of which our body is composed.
"This passage contains another echo of Adam's creation in Genesis 2:7: 'Then the LORD God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being'."
- Sister Nonna Verna Harrison from her article, "John Chrysosom on the Man Born Blind (John 9)."
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This short medical/scientific digression into the function of the complexities of the eye can only enhance our admiration and awe at the great sign of Christ restoring sight to a man born blind! Interesting to read of St. John's own perception of what was involved.
