Today’s gospel reading has Jesus spitting on the clay of the ground and rubbing that clay onto someone’s eyes, enabling him see. It harkens back the creation of man, where God made Adam from “the clay of the ground.”

Physical evil is a result of original sin; a diminishment of the pristine order of creation. Blindness to the eye (and to the soul) is a diminishment of what man was created to be. Hence, Jesus takes some of that “clay of the ground” used in man’s creation, and mixes it with a part of Him (His saliva) to heal and ‘make whole again’ the disabled man.

This is perfect imagery to convey a profound truth. Christ came to heal so that we may see spiritually in this life; and in doing so enabling is to do His will in order to be fully healed and transformed with divine Life in the resurrection on the Last Day.