Protector of our dignity

“And they were watching him to see if he would cure him on the Sabbath day, hoping for something to charge him with”. (Mk 3:2)

How awful. “Hoping for something to charge him with”. Again and again the same situation: they can use anybody for their purpose. Even an ill person, who needs help, who needs to be cured. Who needs compassion.

How often are we surrounded by the people who are used by other people: at work, in family, in daily life. Unfortunately sometimes it happens also to us. How sad.

But we have a protector. He has come to save us, to cure us, and to make us part of His family as His brothers and sisters.

He knew their heart. He knew what would happen: “ The Pharisees went out and began at once to plot with the Herodians against him, discussing how to destroy him” (Mk 3:6). And He let His emotions show: “He looked angrily round at them, grieved to find them so obstinate, and said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out and his hand was restored” (Mk 3:5).

He is our protector. He will defend us and restore our dignity. The dignity the others sometimes fail to see.

“God our Creator, we give thanks to you, who alone have the power to impart the breath of life as you form each of us in our mother’s womb, grant, we pray, that we, whom you have made stewards of creation, may remain faithful to this sacred trust and constant in safeguarding the dignity of every human life.” (Collect)