In today’s Gospel reading, on this Sunday of the Paralytic, we begin a three-week theme of water. The paralytic lies next to a pool, the Samaritan woman goes to the well of Jacob, and the blind man goes to the pool of Siloam.

Fr. Micah briefly retells the story of the paralytic, emphasizing his answer to Christ when he asks if he wants to be well. He answers, “Lord, I have no man to put me into the water when it is troubled, and another goes before me.” This is the great tragedy of the story, that the man had no one in his life to help him. Fr. Micah asserts that this is perhaps the great tragedy of our age as well. Though we live in a world of hyperconnectivity, our loneliness has only become deeper.

This three-week theme of water, Fr. Micah explains, helps us reflect on baptism — which gives us an answer to this loneliness. In baptism, we are grafted onto the body of Christ, and we cannot be parted from him. In baptism, we are joined to a community, and we are connected to our patron saint by our name. In baptism, we are granted a taste of eternal life. Christ is risen, and death — the basis of loneliness — has been defeated.