Contactless church

After the "Give each other fraternal peace" no one, absolutely no one, shook the hand of the neighbor on the bench. And the two people to whom I extended my hand rejected it by returning a gentle oriental greeting. I don't know about you, but I see the danger of a Christian life. contactless.

It was certainly not the Sunday parish Eucharist, but one of those Masses on a weekday, in a centrally located church, early in the morning, where the faithful do not usually know each other.

They arrive right at the start time, sit away from each other and then rush off to get to their jobs in nearby offices and stores on time, so it is understandable that there is no trust, but the popularization of bowing has become pandemic, never better said, since the Covid. Soon, instead of "peace with you", we will say "namaste".

The call to minimize contact during this world catastrophe was more than justified, but, after a while, the hygienic motivation becomes an excuse that hides, in my opinion, something deeper, a subtle form of individualistic faith that places those who practice it at the antipodes of Christian faith.

The mystery of the Incarnation broke the barrier between God and man. Jesus is God who touches and who allows himself to be touched. During his public life, he rebuked the scruples of the Pharisees and their fear of becoming impure through physical contact and, with his death on the cross and the consequent tearing of the veil of the temple, he also signaled the end of the cultic separation between men and "the holy".

Just a few weeks ago we took up the Sunday readings of Ordinary Time which, in the cycle B in which we are, correspond to the Evangelist Mark. This is a Gospel that presents us with a Jesus who, if you will allow me to use the expression, is rather "stumpy", if you will allow me to use the expression.

We see him take Peter's mother-in-law and Jairus' daughter by the hand, touch the sick skin of the leper and the atrophied tongue of the deaf-mute, embrace the children, take them in his arms, lay hands on them and ask them to let them come close to him.

We also see him squeezed in a crowd or in a crowded house, and he even let himself be kissed by Judas in Gethsemane, which indicated that this was a customary form of greeting.

The summit of Jesus' desire to enter into physical contact with his disciples of all times is found in the institution of the Eucharist, where he not only invited us to touch him, but to actually eat him (that is our faith).

We are not circumstantially corporeal spirits, but a unity of body and soul; and, in the Church, members of the one body of Christ, of which he is the head. Therefore, not only the Eucharist makes present this intimacy with the sense of touch, but also the other sacraments.

Thus, in Baptism, we see the sign on the forehead, the anointing on the chest and on the head, the laying on of hands or the rite of the "baptism of the mother", and so on.effetá"At ordination, the bishop imposes his hands on the future priest and anoints his hands with holy chrism; at Confirmation, we also see the imposition of hands and anointing, as well as signs such as the sponsor's hand on the shoulder of the confirmandi or the bishop's embrace or kiss of peace.

In confession, we can see the priest place one or two hands on the penitent's head during absolution; in the anointing of the sick, the minister applies oil on the forehead and hands of the faithful; and in marriage, the contracting parties shake hands, put the ring on each other and give each other the kiss of peace (and this is as far as I can read because then it has to be consummated).

In all these "visible signs of an invisible reality," as the word sacrament is defined, the action of God who washes, heals, nourishes, fortifies, unites, creates, blesses, forgives, transmits his power, welcomes... In short, he loves, because a faith without works, a spiritual action without corporal correspondence, is a dead faith.

We are not angels, but human beings made in the image and likeness of God, of flesh and blood, the same one that will be resurrected transformed and that will accompany us eternally. Why do we reject it, allowing ourselves to be carried away by traditions far removed from what Jesus Christ taught us?

When our disincarnated spiritualism becomes most painful is when we reject the Lord's favorites, the poor, the sick, the elderly, the migrants... With them, Pope Francis warns us, "we can have compassion, but generally we do not touch them.

We offer him the coin, but we avoid touching the hand and throw it away. And we forget that this is the body of Christ! Jesus teaches us not to be afraid to touch the poor and the excluded, because He is in them. Touching the poor can purify us of hypocrisy and make us care about their condition. Touch the excluded.

In a disconnected, individualistic and inhuman world like ours, in the face of the popularization of the contactlessThe Church will be the sacrament of salvation as long as she is able to be the visible sign of a community of true brothers and sisters who, as such, are not afraid to hold hands.

As believers in God the Trinity, a God who is a community of persons in intimate relationship, we must be clear that no one is saved alone, but by the hand of another. Yes, from the hand of the one next to him.