“Look at us …” A miracle of beauty at the gate Beautiful (Acts 3:4-6)

The healing of a crippled beggar took place at the Temple gate called Beautiful. This made me reflect on beauty and its power to heal.

Beauty attracts first, then captivates, and heals. Such is the power of beauty. But why and how? Let’s find out from the story in Acts 3:4.

At the temple gate called Beautiful, a cripple was begging for alms. Peter and John entered the gate and look intently at the beggar. Then Peter commanded, “Look at us… I have neither silver nor gold, but I will give you what I have: In the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, walk!” (4-6).

Why does Peter command, “Look at us!”?

If he wanted the beggar to know the power of a name, he could have said, “Listen to me.” or, “Lend me your ears.”, or something similar.

Or, maybe Peter could hold up something on which the name, Jesus Christ the Nazarene, was written in Aramaic language and say, “Look at these words.” He did not. Peter just said, “Look at us!” Why?

I think Peter wanted the cripple to face him and John, and see their faces and their entire person, and watch and hear how Peter would enunciate, pronounce and emphasize the Name Jesus Christ the Nazarene. It makes sense. Of course, there is power not just in the written word as Jesus had promised, “If you ask in my name, I will do it” (Jn 14:13).

Or as Paul would say later that people would kneel at the mention of the name (Col 3:17). But why demand a face to face encounter?

Squinting at the science and theology of beauty, the transforming influence of beautiful objects and persons is not often talked about in our Church discussions especially on spirituality these days.

I am sure, as many of us do, that Peter and John were surely captivated and possessed, among other things, as were all the apostles, by the beauty of the Risen Christ.They were completely transformed in body, soul and spirit. Once transformed, their reactions manifested those elements that make persons and objects beautiful. These elements are balance, harmony, unity and order producing love and peace. They were beautified, so to say; or, better, they were Christified. Or in romantic language, they fell in love with Risen Jesus!

In the happy faces and gestures of Peter and John, in their facial.expressions, in the sound of their voices, the cripple saw the beauty of love and compassion of Christ; and his heart was touched to the core. He was drawn to an irresistible beauty so difficult to describe. He begins to react bodily and respond. He was becoming beautiful attracted by the presence of the Risen Lord Jesus in the two apostles.

And Peter helps him up as balance, harmony, unity and order, essential elements of beauty return to the cripple’s body, soul and spirit. Acts 3 healing narrative ends showing the cripple’s limbs become firm, and jumping up in excitement, he follows the apostles passing the Beautiful gate into the temple thanking and praising God.

In his famous novel The Idiot, the Russian novelist Feodor Dostoyevsky makes the seemingly foolish Prince Lev Nikolayevich Myshkin as a symbol of Jesus Christ who surprisingly utters a profound wisdom, “It is only beauty that can save the world!”.

The saviors of the world are beautiful people whose personality and character exhibit physically, spiritually, socially and morally the rare virtues of balance, harmony, unity and order which are essential elements of love, justice and peace personified by the Risen Jesus Christ who as God is Truth, Goodness and Beauty Himself.