This week I finished reading a novel loaned to me by a friend. I’m still marveling at having actually read a novel. After nine years of courses and textbooks, this was a real treat. One of the story lines in the book dealt with a group of women making shawls for a women’s shelter. They called the shawls “hugs of comfort”. That got me thinking of hugs. What’s that statistic? A person needs 5 hugs a day. Hmm… I grew up in a family that did not hug or give out much affirmation or compliments. Hugging used to be a very foreign concept to me. Over the years I’ve become good at giving hugs but receiving them still causes me to stiffen up lots of the time. I’m pretty free with hugging my grandson, who at age ten does not always appreciate them or return them. I guess it is part of being a boy and part of growing up.
It’s no secret that the touch of another person can do wonders for one’s well-being. Touch is physically therapeutic, such as massage, and can also be very emotionally healing – hugs, a comforting touch on the shoulder, holding hands. The sensation of being touched in a loving, healing way by someone who truly cares for and about us transcends the senses and heads straight to the heart, warming us in comfort. It feels great to be on the receiving end of such tender touch; it feels great to be on the giving end too.
In the Christian lectionary this weekend we have a healing story within a healing story: the woman with the hemorrhage (Mark 5:25-34). With faith she touched the cloak of Jesus and felt herself being healed. Jesus also felt something: power flowing out of him at the woman’s touch. Though the gospel does not relate whether or not Jesus actually touched the woman, but he did speak to her, it definitely demonstrates the healing power of being in the presence, being touched, by the Sacred.
At the end of last weekend, as we took our grandson home after a camping trip, I gave him a big hug right there out on the sidewalk and told him I love him. To my surprise, and delight, he returned the hug and the sentiment. Hmm…maybe, just maybe he’s getting the hint that hugs are comforting and healing (and not just something his “old” grandma does).
We are always in the holy presence of our Sacred Touch-Healer – there is literally nowhere we can go where we are not wrapped in this presence. The challenge for us many times is to realize this on a conscious level.
Peace on the Journey
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