In today’s gospel reading one can easily recognize three actors: the blind man, the crowd and Jesus. There is something we can learn from each one of these actors.

The blind man teaches us honesty in owning his need of help. We all have in our lives blind spots that we need to own and we can learn this honesty from the first actor. But the blind man also teaches us trust and he does this in two different ways. He trusts that Jesus has the power to heal him, but he also has the trust the Jesus has the compassion to do it.

The second actor, the crowd, reflects at first a me-and-Jesus attitude with no room for others. Without using truly offensive words, they are in effect telling the blind man: shut up, you are disturbing our following Jesus. Yet the crowd does not have a bad heart, any more than the me-and-Jesus people have a bad heart, though they themselves are giving evidence of a blind spot. So, as soon as the Jesus they are following takes a position in favor of the blind man, they change their attitude and encourage him. Who, then, was blind? Jesus cures them also from their own blind spot.

The third actor, Jesus, asks the blind man to name his need and to own it without pretending that he is not in need. The blind man does not make a “creed” profession of faith, like you are the Messiah, but he has trust. Scripture uses the same Greek word –pistis– both for trust and for faith, and Jesus counts the man’s trust as faith: your faith has saved you.