Patrick Comerford
We are in Ordinary Time in the Church Calendar and the week began with the Fourth Sunday after Trinity (Trinity IV, 28 June 2026) and the Feast of Saint Peter and Saint Paul (29 June 2026). We are still in the time known as Peter-tide, a time when many ordinations to the diaconate and priesthood take place.
Later this evening, I hope to take part in the rehearsals with a playreading group in the Library in Stony Stratford. But, before this day begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:
1, reading today’s Gospel reading;
2, a short reflection;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
Matthew 9: 1-8 (NRSVA):
1 And after getting into a boat he crossed the water and came to his own town.
2 And just then some people were carrying a paralysed man lying on a bed. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, ‘Take heart, son; your sins are forgiven.’ 3 Then some of the scribes said to themselves, ‘This man is blaspheming.’ 4 But Jesus, perceiving their thoughts, said, ‘Why do you think evil in your hearts? 5 For which is easier, to say, “Your sins are forgiven”, or to say, “Stand up and walk”? 6 But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’ – he then said to the paralytic – ‘Stand up, take your bed and go to your home.’ 7 And he stood up and went to his home. 8 When the crowds saw it, they were filled with awe, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to human beings.
Today’s Reflections:
This morning’s Gospel reading at the Eucharist (Matthew 9: 1-8) is a healing story that has its synoptic parallels in Mark 2: 1-12 and Luke 5: 18-26.
I have regular appointments with my local GP practice for injections for my B12 deficiency, and I continue to have regular hospital appointments monitoring my pulmonary sarcoidosis and as part of the care and attention I continue to receive as a follow-up to my stroke almost over four years ago in March 2022.
I remain truly grateful for the caring and attentive treatment I receive in hospitals in Milton Keynes, Oxford and Sheffield, and I am even more grateful for the way Charlotte Hunter recognised I was having a stroke, brought me to hospital, ensured I received the attention I needed, visited me every day, and brought me back to Stony Stratford.
Some years ago, at an event in Saint Martin-in-the-Fields Church, Trafalgar Square, when people were asked to bring along their favourite poems, Charlotte brought Seamus Heaney’s poem ‘Miracle’, from his collection Human Chain (2010).
In these poems, written after his stroke in 2005, Seamus Heaney speaks of suffering and mortality. This poem ‘Miracle’ retells the story of the miraculous healing of the man variously described as a paralytic man and a man with palsy. The story is told in all three synoptic Gospels, including this morning’s Gospel reading (Matthew 9: 1-8), and – like Seamus Heaney, I suppose – my situation makes me wonder whether this man was also suffering after a stroke.
It is interesting how Seamus Heaney tells the story of this man’s healing from the perspective of the man’s friends. In this way, his poem becomes an expression of gratitude by the poet to all who helped his recovery after his stroke.
When Jesus looks at the paralysed man brought to him by his friends, he sees not just the faith of the man, but the faith of his friends too. In other words, this is a story of the blessing of friendship and the miracle of community as much as it is a story of miraculous healing.
The poet’s focus is on neither Christ as the healer nor the invalid, but on the friends who in the other synoptic accounts helped this sick man to reach Jesus by lowering him through a skylight in the roof. The title of the poem refers to the miracle in the Gospel story, but for the poet the miracle is found in the opening lines:
Not the one who takes up his bed and walks
But the ones who have known him all along
And carry him in.
The friends of this man love him and seek his healing, no matter what it takes for them to do, and so they become the true miracle in this moment. They are there when no one else is, they care for their friend, and they give him the priceless gift of friendship.
When they hear in Capernaum that Jesus is healing the sick, they give their friend one more gift. They carry him to Jesus. And when they cannot get him through the door, they then lower him through the roof.
What persistent love they show their friend, like the persistent love of one who calls a taxi, packs all my bags, brings me to the A&E unit, stays with me while I am admitted, as I am transferred to the emergency unit, and then, late at night, when I am moved to a ward.
This poem sees the Gospel story through the eyes of this man’s faithful friends. So often, I read this story through the eyes of the paralysed man, through the eyes of the crowd, or even through the eyes of the Pharisees and teachers. But Seamus Heaney invites me to join the man’s friends, who stand with
their shoulders numb, the ache and stoop deeplocked
In their backs, the stretcher handles
Slippery with sweat.
We are invited to stand with those friends, with the hope and the faith and the love that brings them there, to stand with them on behalf of all who hurt, to feel the burns in their hands from the paid-out rope, the ache in their backs from the burden they have carried, to see the gift of this miracle, this grace, that was all gift, but that required something extra of them.
There are many miracles in this story and many lessons. This poem reminds us how sometimes we need to be carried by our friends, while at other times we are the ones who need to help ‘bear one another’s burdens’ (Galatians 6: 2).
Miracle, by Seamus Heaney (1939-2013)
Not the one who takes up his bed and walks
But the ones who have known him all along
And carry him in —
Their shoulders numb, the ache and stoop deeplocked
In their backs, the stretcher handles
Slippery with sweat. And no let up
Until he’s strapped on tight, made tiltable
and raised to the tiled roof, then lowered for healing.
Be mindful of them as they stand and wait
For the burn of the paid out ropes to cool,
Their slight lightheadedness and incredulity
To pass, those who had known him all along.
Today’s Prayers (Thursday 2 July 2026):
In Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), the theme this week, from 28 June to 4 July 2026 (pp 14-15), is ‘Living Stones’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a reflection by the Very Revd Lydia Kelsey Bucklin, President and Dean of Episcopal Divinity School.
The USPG prayer diary today (Thursday 2 July 2026) invites us to pray:
Creator God, remind us of our deep interconnection. Strengthen us to seek the liberation of all people, knowing none of us are free while violence and injustice persist.
The Collect of the Day:
O God, the protector of all who trust in you,
without whom nothing is strong, nothing is holy:
increase and multiply upon us your mercy;
that with you as our ruler and guide
we may so pass through things temporal
that we lose not our hold on things eternal;
grant this, heavenly Father,
for our Lord Jesus Christ’s sake,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Eternal God,
comfort of the afflicted and healer of the broken,
you have fed us at the table of life and hope:
teach us the ways of gentleness and peace,
that all the world may acknowledge
the kingdom of your Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Additional Collect:
Gracious Father,
by the obedience of Jesus
you brought salvation to our wayward world:
draw us into harmony with your will,
that we may find all things restored in him,
our Saviour Jesus Christ.
The Collect on the Eve of Saint Thomas:
Almighty and eternal God,
who, for the firmer foundation of our faith,
allowed your holy apostle Thomas
to doubt the resurrection of your Son
till word and sight convinced him:
grant to us, who have not seen, that we also may believe
and so confess Christ as our Lord and our God;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Yesterday’s reflections
Continued tomorrow
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
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