Fourth Sunday of Lent
Today is known as Laetare Sunday, the fourth Sunday of Lent. This Sunday gets its name from the first few words of the traditional Latin entrance verse (Introit) for the Mass of the day: Lætare Jerusalem et conventum facite omnes qui diligitis eam; gaudete cum lætitia, qui in tristitia fuistis, ut exsultetis et satiemini ab uberibus consolationis vestrae. Psalm: Lætatus sum in his quæ dicta sunt mihi: in domum Domini ibimus. (Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and all who love her. Be joyful, all who were in mourning; exult and be satisfied at her consoling breast. Psalm: I was glad when they said unto me, We will go into the house of the Lord.) We are closer to the Passion of Jesus, but we are anticipating the Passion with the spirit of optimism. So traditionally, the Laetare Sunday is the day of rejoicing with the celebration in anticipation of the glorious day of the resurrection.
The Gospel reading from St. John's Gospel that we hear today gives us the reason to rejoice and celebrate because Jesus performs an extraordinary miracle, healing the blind man. But the Pharisees do not seem to rejoice at all and even react with some hostility towards Jesus. The Pharisees do not rejoice over what seems good, that is, the restoration of the blind man's sight. But rather, they stress what they see as something bad, that is, the breaking of the Sabbath. But in reality, Jesus keep the Sabbath because when the Lord forbade work on the Sabbath, he had in mind the work of sin. Therefore, according to St. Thomas Aquinas in his commentary on the Gospel of John, he who performs work of sin on the Sabbath breaks the Sabbath. So, Jesus, who was without sin, did not commit any sin, but kept the Sabbath.
Sin is spiritual blindness. Human beings are born blind because the original sin was contracted, which causes blindness to occur through the sin of Adam. One manifestation of spiritual blindness is that we often cannot rejoice over something good that happens right in front of us. As we approach the end of the Lenten journey, perhaps we can reflect on our spiritual blindness, especially how it has prevented us from rejoicing over something good that happened near us.