Ouch!

A Reflection on the Second Reading for Sunday, July 7th, 2024:
Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

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2 Corinthians
​12.7-10

Brothers and sisters: Considering the exceptional character of the revelations, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated.

Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”

So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.

Pause. Pray. Reflect.

When I was first getting to know Saint Francis of Assisi as a saint-friend, my whole being was inspired by his total choice of poverty, the radicality of his self-giving, and the way in which he left absolutely nothing out in his living of the Gospel. I remember watching a movie about his life in which the background refrain resounded: “Do not store up treasures on earth, where moth and rust decay, but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven!” I was so struck to the heart that I paused the movie and went to a place of prayer to hear what the Lord was speaking to me in that burning moment. There was a lot there – in fact, the beginnings of a Franciscan vocation! – but the deepest and most central part was that, as long as Christ was the source and the goal of my life, nothing else mattered. 

I saw Saint Francis as a sort of superhuman whose immense poverty gave him the freedom to fly above earthly needs. The thing is though, Saint Francis was not superhuman. Thank goodness for those of us who are trying to follow him! He was exactly what we all are, and what the Son of God chose to be: fully human. So what allowed him to live so fully for the Kingdom, storing up treasures in heaven? 

Saint Paul seems to be showing us today that it is not by bypassing our humanity or even our weaknesses that we come to full union with God, but by accepting them. What I love about this passage is that it doesn’t convey the mistaken impression I originally had of Saint Francis, that he was a superhero or a perfect person. 

Even after Saint Paul encountered Christ himself on the road and changed his whole life, he didn’t always completely accept the crosses he was asked to bear, particularly the ones stemming from his own weakness. He tells us that three times he begged God that this weakness might be taken away! If you were writing a letter to loved ones, imagine the parts of your life or personality that you would choose to call “a thorn in your flesh.” Have you ever grabbed the wrong part of a rose stem or cactus? Ouch! Thorns are so painful. Imagine one that you cannot get out of your skin. Even after going to the Divine Physician, Saint Paul still has his thorn, not because the Lord could not heal him if He chose to but because He knew that greater glory would come from Paul’s acceptance of this weakness of his. Power is made perfect in weakness.

The Lord did not want Paul to be a superhuman. He did not want Francis of Assisi nor any of his quite motley crew of followers down the centuries to be superhuman! He wants real, live, flesh and blood, salt of the earth people who are humble enough to know that without Him we can do nothing! So next time we get pricked by the thorn in our flesh, after the initial ouch (which is only natural), may we remember that we are in the company of the saints and say along with them, “I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.” Amen.



Sr. Angela Burnham

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