The image of Jesus as exorcist is someone who has experienced his own demons (Mark 1:12-13). The temptation stories (of which we will hear in a few weeks as we enter Lent) point to the image of a wounded healer, to an image of one who by his own experience understands vulnerability and internalized oppression. In having recovered their own hearts, healers have some understanding of the suffering of others.
Naming the demons means knowing the demons . . . The Gospels imply that anyone who exorcises cannot be a stranger to demons . . . To have faced our demons is never to forget their power to hurt and never to forget the power to heal that lies in touching broken-heartedness . . . Jesus hears, below the demon noises, an anguished cry for deliverance. Through . . . mutual touching, . . . community is co-created as a continuing, liberating, redemptive reality. – Rita Nakashima Brock, Journeys by Heart: A Christology of Erotic Power (Crossroad Publishing, 1988).
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