The leprosy left him immediately, and he was made clean.From the Gospel according to Mark. Mk 1:40-45

A leper came to Jesus and kneeling down begged him and said, “If you wish, you can make me clean.”
Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand, touched him, and said to him, “I do will it. Be made clean.”
The leprosy left him immediately, and he was made clean.
Then, warning him sternly, he dismissed him at once. He said to him, “See that you tell no one anything, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses prescribed; that will be proof for them.”

The man went away and began to publicize the whole matter. He spread the report abroad so that it was impossible for Jesus to enter a town openly.
He remained outside in deserted places, and people kept coming to him from everywhere.

The Gospel of the Lord.

Opposite Worlds.

An unclean heart in the times of Jesus was confused with leprosy. The leper makes a direct call to the Heart of Jesus when he says, “If you wish…”. That “if you wish” could perfectly be replaced by “if you love me…”.

So, in the face of this plea for love, Jesus is moved and touches the leper. At that moment, two opposite worlds come into contact: the world of impurity and the world of purity. Leprosy in contact with human flesh overcomes human nature. In contrast, in contact with divinity, it is inexorably defeated.

Today, as a sinful spouse, I kneel and plead: Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean.

Applied to Married Life:

Matt: (With his head bowed before the Blessed Sacrament next to Lorraine, his wife) Lord, why have you entrusted me with this wife if I am not worthy of her? I don’t give her the understanding she needs; I don’t treat her with the delicacy befitting a Princess, the daughter of the King of Kings. But if you wish, you can cleanse me of my pride.

Lorraine: Lord, I can’t understand Matt’s ways. I can’t love him as he deserves because I don’t accept his roughness and what I sometimes judge as hardness of heart. But Lord, if you wish, you can cleanse me of my pride.

The Lord: Of course, I love you. Have you noticed a certain pain in your soul due to each other’s attitudes? Well, love that pain because it is what I send you to purify yourselves.

Mother,

If you love us, do not abandon us in this valley of tears, Mother of Mercy, our advocate.

They ate and were satisfied.From the Gospel according to Mark. Mk 8:1-10

In those days when there again was a great crowd without anything to eat, Jesus summoned the disciples and said, “My heart is moved with pity for the crowd, because they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat. If I send them away hungry to their homes, they will collapse on the way, and some of them have come a great distance.” His disciples answered him, “Where can anyone get enough bread to satisfy them here in this deserted place?” Still he asked them, “How many loaves do you have?” They replied, “Seven.” He ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground. Then, taking the seven loaves he gave thanks, broke them, and gave them to his disciples to distribute, and they distributed them to the crowd. They also had a few fish. He said the blessing over them and ordered them distributed also. They ate and were satisfied. They picked up the fragments left over–seven baskets. There were about four thousand people. He dismissed the crowd and got into the boat with his disciples and came to the region of Dalmanutha.

The Gospel of the Lord.

Love The Humiliation.

We see how the Lord feels great compassion towards others and none towards Himself. He cares that others are well-fed, yet He sacrifices His life on the Cross.

Self-pity is a horror. It is a degenerative disease of marital love that leads to total destruction. It all comes from pride and being offended by everything the spouse does or doesn’t do. Therefore, pride must be exterminated. How? By making an effort every time one feels offended? Yes, but it’s not enough. It is necessary to love the despises I receive. Loving them will allow me to free myself from that “fake king”, my pride, and will allow the King of Love, Christ, to reign in my heart. Then I can begin to love as He loves.

Applied to married life:

Adele: Forgive me, dear, because I am insisting on changing you. I see your sins, and it feels like I am banging my head against a wall that doesn’t listen, and I have to shout for it to understand the harm it does to me and our children. But when I see how you suffer, I break down. It is compassion that helps me regain love for you.

Declan: Forgive me, Adele, because I feel attacked with each of your corrections, and I respond defending myself against you like an enemy. I know you want the best for me, and you want to help me become holy. But I don’t receive your corrections as good, probably because of my pride. But I know I have to overcome it. I want to love humiliations because they will defeat that pride and allow me to love you with God’s love.

Adele: I forgive you, Declan. Shall we be kind to each other again?

Declan: I´d love it. I forgive you too, Adele.

Mother,

Help us destroy our self-pity so that we do not worship golden calves that are not my God. To Him be glory and praise forever.”

The dogs under the table eat the children’s scraps.From the Gospel according to Mark. Mk 7:24-30

Jesus went to the district of Tyre. He entered a house and wanted no one to know about it, but he could not escape notice. Soon a woman whose daughter had an unclean spirit heard about him. She came and fell at his feet. The woman was a Greek, a Syrophoenician by birth, and she begged him to drive the demon out of her daughter.
He said to her, “Let the children be fed first. For it is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.”
She replied and said to him, “Lord, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s scraps.”
Then he said to her, “For saying this, you may go. The demon has gone out of your daughter.”

When the woman went home, she found the child lying in bed and the demon gone.

The Gospel of the Lord.

Against the Demons.

The Lord says, “Because of what you have said, the demon has left your daughter.” The question is, how did she speak to deserve such a reward? Well, with humility and faith. Those are the two keys that made Jesus cast out the demons from within us: Humility and faith. If I cultivate these two attitudes, my marriage can change drastically.

Notice that what Jesus says to the pagan woman is harsh. I could react by saying it seems unfair, or that God doesn’t act like that because He doesn’t make distinctions between people… But that woman accepts Jesus’ conditions with humility, and the result is that she saves her daughter.

Applied to marriged life:

John: My wife is insane. She overreacts and loses control saying outrageous things. She lies just to make me look bad and takes unwarranted reprisals against us.

Mentor marriage: I understand, John. It must be really tough.

John: The problem is, she doesn’t want to change. She thinks the problem is not her but everyone else around her. She has been subjected to many dissatisfactions in life, and now she has exploded in this uncontrollable way.

Mentors: Well, hang in there, John. You have a tough but great task ahead: You just need humility and faith. Humility to accept the humiliations and contempt, and faith to believe that by offering these humiliations for her in union with Christ, He will save her. Make her feel understood, feel that you are by her side. She has been alone for many years, and now it’s your turn to suffer for her salvation. One day the Lord will resurrect your marriage, and you will have been an artisan of God’s love in her, a witness to God’s love in her. You have this great mission, John. May the Holy Spirit always be with you.

(John took this mission seriously. He understood that the fight is not against his wife but against the demons that had her dominated and blinded. He said yes, with faith and humility, and the Lord cast those demons out of her heart).

Mother,

Sometimes, we don’t realize that we are subjected to our sins. Demons play with us, with our feelings, with our reasoning, with our pride… and take over our will. Let’s not forget that we are the adequate help for each other, especially on the path to heaven. Praise the Lord, who wants to free us from all evil. Amen.

From the Gospel according to Mark. Mk 7:14-23

Jesus summoned the crowd again and said to them, “Hear me, all of you, and understand. Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person; but the things that come out from within are what defile.”

When he got home away from the crowd his disciples questioned him about the parable.
He said to them, “Are even you likewise without understanding? Do you not realize that everything that goes into a person from outside cannot defile, since it enters not the heart but the stomach and passes out into the latrine?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.) “But what comes out of the man, that is what defiles him. From within the man, from his heart, come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly. All these evils come from within and they defile.”

The Gospel of the Lotd.

Actually, I love you.

If I don’t experience love towards my spouse in any situation, it is not my spouse´s fault, no matter how badly he or she may be doing. It is my fault and it arises from my heart. It is called sin because I have been created to love.

Applied to married life:

Tessa: James, I have to admit that I’ve been blaming you for my sins for a while. For instance, the other day, I felt offended when you told me I am too emotional, and I accused you of having a hardened heart. That is called revenge, and I apologize.

James: Tessa, I did run away from you when I saw your attitude, and that is called lack of charity, a sin that came from my heart, and I apologize. I didn’t give you what you needed from me then, because I considered it useless, and that is called pusillanimity, and it’s a sin that came from my heart, and I apologize.

Tessa: It’s also true that I started lecturing you with arrogance, and arrogance is a sin that came from my heart. I also apologize for that. You can’t imagine the mess I created in a second… But you should know that I let my passions take over. The truth is that I love you.

James: I love you too, Tessa, and I’m sorry for hurting you with my sins because sin always mistreats. Is there any way I can make it up to you?

Mother,

May each of us be attentive to our own hearts instead of focusing on the speck in someone else’s eye. Praised be God, who always looks at us with mercy.