Sunday of the Man Born Blind:
Questions and gazes: a journey towards the light
Year A – Lent – 4th Sunday
John 9:1–41: “Are we blind too?”
The fourth Sunday of Lent is a second baptismal catechesis on LIGHT, following last Sunday’s one on water. The protagonist is the man born blind whom Jesus heals, presented by John in chapter 9 of his Gospel. It is a beautiful text which has always been read as an illustration of baptism. The man born blind represents each one of us, whom Jesus reshapes (Genesis 2:7) and sends to the pool of Siloam, a symbol of baptism.
Life is born blind; humanisation is a process of illumination
Life on earth arose in a state of blindness and remained so for millions of years. Even a newborn becomes able to see only gradually. In fact, one could say that humanisation is a slow and demanding process of illumination. The same is true of the life of faith, which is grafted onto this process and brings it to its full fulfilment. From the vision of natural reality, faith leads us towards the contemplation of the invisible, until we enter the full Light which is God himself. Without the openness of faith, vision remains incomplete and risks falling back into the darkness of meaninglessness. “In you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light” (Psalm 36:9–10).
Questions and gazes
The account of the healing of the man born blind is woven around a long series of questions (sixteen). I will try to summarise them in seven. Questions and answers place before us different attitudes and ways of seeing. This Gospel also invites us to ask ourselves questions so as to become aware of the quality of our gaze and to see how far we have progressed in our journey of baptismal illumination.
The passage begins by saying that “Jesus, as he passed by, saw…”. Jesus is the one who passes and sees. Like the Samaritan in the parable: “as he passed by, he saw him and had compassion” (Luke 10). And he continues to pass by and look at us with compassion. Yet we are blind and often do not even realise it, accustomed to passing by without seeing, or to looking — or being looked at — with indifference or pity.
1. “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”
“Jesus, as he passed by, saw a man blind from birth.” The apostles also see him and ask a question: “Who sinned…?”. This is the gaze of prejudice, which blames even before trying to understand another person’s situation.
2. “Isn’t this the man who used to sit and beg?”
His neighbours and acquaintances ask themselves: could it really be him? “Yes, it is I!” And how is it that you can now see? “It was the man called Jesus!” And where is he? “I do not know.” And everything ends there. This is the gaze of superficial curiosity. It does not seek to go deeper into what it sees, even when it is something unprecedented such as a miracle.
3. “How can a sinner perform signs like these?”
Then appears the inquisitorial gaze of the Pharisees, who want to investigate whether the law has been respected. A glimmer of light seems to emerge: “How can a sinner perform signs like these?”, but it is immediately stifled. They are not concerned that a blind man has been healed, because they do not have the good of the person at heart. What matters to them is not the greatness of the sign, but only that the Sabbath law has not been broken.
The witness is questioned. His gaze has entered a process of illumination. When he is asked, “What do you say about him, since he opened your eyes?”, Jesus is no longer merely “the man called Jesus”, but “a prophet”.
4. “Is this your son, whom you say was born blind? How then does he now see?”
The guardians of the law do not want to admit reality because it does not fit into their mental framework. For them, life is not autonomous. Even reality must submit to the law. They question his parents who, out of fear, distance themselves from their son: “We do not know!”. The gaze of fear is not supportive; it abandons the other to his fate, even if that person is one’s own child.
5. “You were born entirely in sin, and are you trying to teach us?”
The healed blind man is questioned again, in an attempt to intimidate him and catch him in error, so as to safeguard the law and their own position as holders of power. The Pharisees display all their knowledge: “Give glory to God! We know that this man is a sinner.”
“We know… we know.” They know everything.
The witness, for his part, says: “One thing I do know: I was blind and now I see!” They insist: “What did he do to you? How did he open your eyes?” The newly sighted man, increasingly confident, becomes bold: “Why do you want to hear it again? Do you also want to become his disciples?” At this point the fury of the gaze of falsehood erupts, unable to accept being challenged or questioned:
“You were born entirely in sin, and are you trying to teach us?” And they cast him out. The darkness grows thicker and closes itself to the light:
“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:5).
6. “Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
Then Jesus looks for him and, finding him, asks him:
“Do you believe in the Son of Man?”
He replied, “And who is he, Sir, that I may believe in him?”
Jesus said to him, “You have seen him; it is he who is speaking with you.”
He said, “Lord, I believe!”
And he worshipped him.
This is the gaze of faith. The blind man is fully flooded with Light.
7. “Are we blind too?”
The account ends with a troubling statement from Jesus: “I came into this world for judgement, so that those who do not see may see, and those who see may become blind.”
Then comes a worrying question that all of us should ask: “Are we blind too?”
“If you were blind, you would not have sin; but now that you say, ‘We see’, your sin remains.”
The first illumination is to recognise that we are blind!
There is a “good” sin — a saving one — that opens us to God’s mercy. And there is a “bad” sin of the person who feels righteous and self-sufficient, which closes us to grace.
In conclusion…
I invite you to reread the text of the second reading: “Brothers and sisters, once you were darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Live then as children of light” (Ephesians 5:8–14).
The risk of falling back into darkness is a daily one. Becoming aware of our blindness (Revelation 3:17–18) and caring for the brightness of our eyes (Matthew 6:23) are Lenten tasks.
Let us also cry out to the Lord, like the blind man of Jericho:
Lord, let me see again!
Fr Manuel João Pereira Correia, mccj
Fr. Manuel João, comboni missionary
Sunday Reflection
from the womb of my whale, ALS
Our cross is the pulpit of the Word
