Wednesday of Easter Week

He leaped up, stood, and walked around,

and went into the temple with them,
walking and jumping and praising God.

When I was a chaplain at the University of Minnesota Hospital I was occasionally called to the Shriners Hospital for Children, to anoint patients before their surgery. Boys and girls came with their families from all over the United States to receive free treatment, helping them to stand tall and walk straight. Seeing the children with sadly twisted legs, arms and spines I was reminded of the terrible suffering that often afflicts our human life.

With our cities segregated into rich, middle and poor neighborhoods and our experience dominated by the antiseptic lens of the television, we often overlook the many miseries of human life. 
Only lately, and tentatively, have people with disabilities dared to come out and demand their fair share of life. For too long they were hidden away by the shame of their families. Christians have considered disability a sign of God’s disfavor. If they could do nothing else about it, they could hide it.

Since humans first gathered into cities we have seen afflicted human beings begging in our streets. They might not survive in the countryside where their only support was an impoverished family, but in the cities they could accost and beg from strangers. Human compassion, with or without a religious faith, can hardly turn away from such pathos.

Today’s first reading reminds us of this familiar tragedy; here is a crippled man begging at the Beautiful Gate of Jerusalem’s temple. He might as well represent every sick and disabled person on earth, needing compassion and help, and receiving barely enough to survive. Twenty centuries later, here in the United States, we know, “People don’t live on the street; they die on it.” Taxpayers provide some assistance to the poor and needy, but it's usually done begrudgingly and with innumerable controls, and it's barely enough for human subsistence. 

Peter and John, who have neither silver nor gold, give from their superabundance. God has blessed them richly with the name of Jesus. The Apostle’s freedom to heal this fellow demonstrates our new freedom. We can be boldly generous because God will provide everything we ask. Our roots run deep and our fruit is plentiful, not because we are wealthy by human standards but because God’s providential love is inexhaustible.  A cloud of witnesses in our churches and volunteer organizations continually tells us stories of God’s generosity. Religious magazines and newspapers report innumerable incidents of charity. They all agree, “I have neither silver nor gold, but what I do have I give you!”