MARY, OUR MOTHER

SCRIPTURE COMMENTARY #234

And there was a certain man there that had been eight and thirty years under his infirmity. Him when Jesus had seen lying, and knew that he had been now a long time, he saith to him: "Wilt thou be made whole?" The infirm man answered him: "Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pond. For whilst I am coming, another goeth down before me." Jesus saith to him: "Arise, take up thy bed and walk." And immediately the man was made whole: and he took up his bed and walked. (John 5:5-9)

THE MISERY OF UNREDEEMED MANKIND: The condition of the sick man, for so many years miserable and abandoned by all who might have helped him, is, according to St. Augustine, Venerable Bede and others, a striking picture of the misery of unredeemed mankind. Man had turned away from God, and remained sunk in vice and sin for four thousand years; and there was no one to help him. Then the Son of God had mercy on him and became Man Himself in order to redeem him. He, the Incarnate Son of God, is our helper and comforter!

[From 'A Practical Commentary on Holy Scripture' by Bishop Knecht, D.D.]
(1899 Douay-Rheims Bible)