VOICE OF THE LOGOS (34): REFLECTION/HOMILY FOR MONDAY OF THE FOURTH WEEK OF LENT, YEAR 1

When Joy Finds You Beyond the Sanctuaries, Basilicas, or Pilgrimage Sites

First Reading: Isaiah 65:17-21
Responsorial Psalm: Ps. 29(30):2,4-6,11-13
Gospel: John 4:43-54
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Many people find great spiritual benefit in traveling to holy places. Pilgrimages to sites like Jerusalem, Lourdes, Fatima, and even local Marian shrines are often undertaken with the hope of experiencing something extraordinary. We go expecting to encounter God more vividly, to receive healing, clarity, or consolation. The journey to a sacred place often brings with it high expectations. Yet, there are moments when God intervenes in the quiet, unexpected corners of our lives, away from sanctuaries, basilicas, or pilgrimage sites. Pilgrimages, no doubt, are noble and spiritually enriching. Yet, this Laetare week gently shifts our attention from the exclusivity of holy places to the reality that God’s grace and joy can reach us even in ordinary, unexpected places. As we enter Laetare Week, the Church invites us to anticipate with joy the new life of Easter. This week opens our hearts to the vision of restoration, renewal, and ultimately, rejoicing. Each reading orients us to a God who brings life where death reigned, hope where despair ruled, and joy where sorrow lingered. But perhaps most striking in today’s readings is the idea that such joy is not necessarily located in the sacred places we expect. Instead, joy breaks in beyond the temple, in unfamiliar territories, along the paths of trust.

The First Reading from Isaiah (65:17-21) belongs to the post-exilic prophetic literature. Its “Sitz im Leben” is deeply rooted in the return of the Jewish people from Babylonian captivity and the rebuilding of Jerusalem. This was a time of shattered hopes and deferred dreams. The temple had been destroyed. The land of promise had become a land of ruins. Yet, God speaks through Isaiah: “Lo, I am about to create new heavens and a new earth… I create Jerusalem to be a joy.” The Hebrew root word for joy here, śāśôn, denotes an exuberant celebration, often linked with communal festivity and deliverance. However, this joy is tied to a renewed geography: Jerusalem, once a place of judgment and exile, is reimagined as a space of delight. The promise is not just abstract restoration; it is locative. God situates joy in a place that had known devastation. This is significant. It tells us that joy is not merely an internal state or emotional uplift but a divine reordering of space and life. The passage reminds us that even familiar places marred by sorrow can become vessels of renewal. However, what is even more remarkable is how this promised joy will not be limited to the rebuilt temple but will permeate daily life, homes, labour, family – ordinary spheres of human existence.

Likewise, the Responsorial Psalm (30) continues this theme and functions as a poetic response to this promise. The psalmist gives thanks for having been lifted from death and healed. “You have turned my mourning into dancing,” he says. Its context often associated with someone recovering from grave illness or near-death experience. Here again, joy is born not within the temple, but in the personal, interior restoration of life. The Hebrew root rapha’ for healing suggests not just physical cure, but holistic restoration. God’s anger, which lasts a moment, gives way to favour that lasts a lifetime. Night gives way to morning. The transitions in the psalm reflect more than just emotional shifts; they are signs of divine intervention in human fragility. The joy described here is deeply experiential, emerging not because the psalmist is in a holy place, but because the Lord acted in his lowliness. It strengthens the idea that the joy of salvation is not location-bound. It is a grace that breaks into the ordinary places of life, like our rooms, hospital beds, and inner crises, wherever we are willing to cry out.

Interestingly, the Gospel of John situates us in a completely different setting. Jesus returns to Cana in Galilee, the location of His first sign, but the narrative emphasis shifts to a royal official from Capernaum. This man travels to Cana to meet Jesus, pleading for the healing of his dying son. The “Sitz im Leben” reflects a time when Galilee was regarded as peripheral, politically insignificant, and religiously inferior compared to Judea and Jerusalem. Yet here, in the margins, Christ performs His second sign. The Gospel narrative deliberately avoids any reference to the temple. The Greek verb used in verse 50 when Jesus says, “Go, your son lives” is zēsei, from zaō, meaning “to live” or “to come to life.” The word mirrors the restoration to life seen in the Psalm and the promise in Isaiah. But this life is restored without Jesus physically visiting the child, without ritual, and outside any liturgical context. The miracle takes place across a geographical distance, as the official returns home. It is along this journey – outside the sacred precincts, that he meets the joy of fulfilled faith. Not only is his son healed, but the entire household comes to believe.

The geographical markers in the Gospel text are particularly instructive. Capernaum, whose name is often interpreted as “village of Nahum” or “village of consolation,” ironically bore little evidence of consolation in Jesus’ time. It was a border town under strong Roman presence, populated by tax collectors, merchants, Gentiles, and Jews alike, which was a symbol of cultural and religious mixture. The Gospels frequently portray it as spiritually resistant; later in Matthew 11:23, Jesus condemns Capernaum for its unbelief despite the miracles done there. Traditions even associate the area with demonic possession and spiritual darkness, as seen in Jesus’ many exorcisms performed in or around that town. Despite this background of confusion, compromise, and even spiritual pollution, Capernaum becomes the unexpected site of joy and new life. Not the holy city of Jerusalem, and not even Cana where Jesus had previously revealed His glory, but this town marked by ambiguity and impurity receives the grace of divine restoration. This narrative reversal disrupts conventional assumptions that salvation must unfold in visibly sacred or morally upright environments. Instead, the life-giving word of Christ reaches across geography and spiritual boundaries, bringing joy and healing even to places marred by false religion, oppression, or spiritual decline.

This reading teaches that God is not confined to physical structures or locations such as churches, or pilgrimage sites. Pilgrimage is noble, Church buildings are important, but we must not idolize location. Joy may meet us in the hospital corridor, in the long walk home, or in the middle of personal exile. What sanctifies a space is not its historical prestige but God’s initiative to speak and act within it. We must learn to listen for His voice not only in sanctuaries but also in silence, in our fatigue, and in our interrupted routines. Sometimes the miracle comes long after we have left the holy ground. God’s grace is not restricted by borders, rituals, or institutions. He sanctifies the space where faith and trust are expressed.

Another powerful lesson is the significance of moving toward Jesus, even without full understanding. The royal official was not a scholar or disciple. He likely came from a background far removed from Jewish covenantal theology. Yet his willingness to leave Capernaum, to move toward Christ, opened a path to grace. Many people today remain spiritually paralyzed, waiting for God to come to them. But sometimes, it is in the movement, in the vulnerability of seeking, that we discover the unexpected joy of being met on the road. This movement is not just geographical but also spiritual. It may involve leaving comfort zones, traditions, or misplaced expectations behind.

Also, we see that delayed responses from God are not denials. The royal official receives no immediate sign. Jesus does not even accompany him. Yet, the man believes. His joy is birthed in faith and trust rather than sight. This challenges us to rethink how we measure divine love. When answers to prayer feel delayed or absent, it is not because God is withholding joy, but because He is deepening our capacity to receive it. The boy’s healing did not just restore him; it renewed an entire household. That is how God works: He delays sometimes to extend the reach of joy.

Finally, this Laetare week reminds us that joy is often born in the gap between request and fulfilment. The official believed before he saw. This is the essence of Lenten faith: a belief in Easter life while still carrying the weight of Good Friday. Joy does not always scream; sometimes it whispers. And it is often discovered not at the shrine, but in the ordinary threshold where our need meets God’s initiative. It may find us far from where we thought it would – beyond the Church building, beyond our timetable, beyond our sense of control. Yet when it arrives, it bears the unmistakable mark of the risen Lord who brings life wherever He is trusted.

O that today you would listen to his VOICE, harden not your hearts! (Ps. 95:7)

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Shalom!
© Fr. Chinaka Justin Mbaeri, OSJ
Seminário Padre Pedro Magnone, São Paulo, Brazil
nozickcjoe@gmail.com / fadacjay@gmail.com

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