All the gospel readings, beloved brothers and sisters, give us great things that are suitable for the present and future life. But today’s reading both conveys all that hope can give and excludes all that despair carries. Our condition is a hard and lamentable one: our innate weakness forces to sin and our confusion prohibits us from confessing our knowledge of sin. [We think that] to do evil is not shameful and that to confess is a shame. We are afraid to admit what we are not afraid to commit. But today a woman when she sought a secret medicine for her modest wound, discovered silence through which she, as a sinner, was able to come for forgiveness. Her first happiness did not come for the deformity of sin but her second happiness was to discover forgiveness of sins for secret sins. The prophet who felt this said, “Blessed are those whose iniquities are remitted and whose sins are covered.” (Psalm 32). Look, says the evangelist, a woman who suffered from the flow of blood for twelve years approached from behind and touched the hem of his clothes (Matt 9). The woman fled to an unexpected faith for whom a cure had long been lacking. She who had been confounded in her search for a medicine wanted to enjoy wholeness. She did not want to be known by him whom she believed could save her. Like a gust of wind, this woman was disturbed by a gale of thoughts. The cause [of her sickness] collided with faith, hope with fear, necessity with shame. The coldness of fear froze the warmth of trust, obscured the light of faith. The power of shame, shameful necessity broke the confidence of hope.
It says “she approached from behind” But where from behind? “She touched the edge of his clothes.” She approached from behind. But where? There was nothing behind him. There he found a face which he turned away. In Christ there was a body with many parts but simple deity. There was in Christ a complex body but also an all-seeing (totus) eye that saw her begging behind him. “She approached from behind and touch the edge of his clothes. O what did that woman see dwelling in the inner heart (in interioribus) of Christ! She saw total power dwelling on the edge of Christ’s divinity. O how that woman taught the greatness of Christ’s body, she who proved that there is something only in the edge of Christ himself!
Let Christians who touch the body of Christ today hear what medicine they can take from his own body when that woman grasped complete health from only the edges of Christ. We should weep that this woman brought medicine to her wound while in our case the medicine itself turns back into a wound. So it is that the Apostle admonishes and deplores those who touch the body of Christ in an unworthy manner for whoever touches (tangit) the body of Christ unworthily receives judgment for himself. In that case, boldness overtakes sickness; here faith should receive wholeness. But he (Paul) brings in, “Therefore, many among you are weak and sick and many are sleeping.” Likewise, he calls those dead sleeping, those whom he mourns as already buried in a living body.
Omnes evangelicae lectiones, fratres charissimi, magna nobis et praesentis, et futurae vitae commoda largiuntur. Sed hodierna lectio, et totum quod est spei, contulit, et quidquid est desperationis exclusit. Est nobis dura et deflenda conditio: peccare nos cogit fragilitas innata, et confiteri prohibet confusio cognata peccati; malum enim facere pudor non est, et pudor est confiteri: timemus dicere, quod committere non timemus. Sed hodie mulier, cum quaereret medicinam tacitam vulneri verecundo, invenit silentium, per quod possit peccator ad veniam pervenire. Prima est felicitas in peccatorum turpitudinem non venisse, sed felicitas est secunda peccatorum veniam peccatis latentibus invenisse. Hoc propheta senserat, qui dicebat: Beati, quorum remissae sunt iniquitates: et quorum tecta sunt peccata (Psal. XXXI). Ecce, inquit evangelista, mulier, quae sanguinis fluxum patiebatur ab annis duodecim, accessit retro et tetigit fimbriam vestimenti ejus (Matth. IX). Confugit mulier ad fidem subitam, cui longa defecerat cura: quae confundebatur medicinam petere, furari voluit sanitatem; nesciri se ab eo voluit, a quo se credidit posse salvari. Ut aer ventorum turbine, sic cogitationum procellis mulier turbabatur: confligebat cum fide causa, cum timore spes, necessitas cum pudore; timoris frigus exstinguebat crudelitatis ardorem, obscurabat lucem fidei vis pudoris, spei confidentiam necessitas verecunda frangebat.
Accessit, inquit, retro. Sed ubi retro? Et tetigit fimbriam vestimenti ejus. Accessit retro. Sed ubi? Retro nil erat, ibi faciem quam declinabat invenit. Erat in Christo corpus multiplex, sed erat deitas simplex; erat totus oculus, qui post se supplicem sic videbat. Accessit retro, et tetigit fimbriam vestimenti ejus. O quid ista mulier vidit habitare in interioribus Christi, quae in Christi fimbria divinitatis totam vidit inhabitare virtutem! O quam docuit mulier quantum sit corpus Christi, quae in Christi quamnam de ipso corpore sumere possunt medicinam, quando mulier totam rapuit de sola Christi fimbria sanitatem.
Sed quod nobis flendum est, mulier de vulnere medicinam tulit, nobis medicina ipsa retorquetur in vulnus. Hinc est quod Apostolus tangentes indigne corpus Christi taliter admonet, et deplorat: Qui enim tangit indigne corpus Christi, judicium sibi sumit. Et quod inde temeritas infirmitatem capiat, unde fides accipere debebat sanitatem, rursus intulit: Propterea inter vos multi infirmi et imbecilles, et dormiunt multi (I Cor. XI). Item dormientes mortuos dicit, quos luget in vivo corpore jam sepultos.