Like the sun that God causes to rise on the good and the bad, so too good health is experienced by both the good and the bad. Similarly, sickness—sometimes believed to be a punishment for sin—is also the lot of both good and bad alike. However, although this suggests that illness and disease cannot be unequivocally attributed to sin, our sinful condition does affect our health. Most obvious, are those vices and addictions that directly harm our bodies—things like excessive eating, drinking, insufficient exercise, along with a host of other bodily-harmful behaviors associated with sin. Jesus seems to acknowledge this connection with his initial words to the paralytic: Child your sins are forgiven. Now, whereas the man’s paralysis was not necessarily a direct consequence of his sins, his restoration to full health would remain incomplete without the forgiveness of his sins. And so, perhaps, the simplest lesson from today’s gospel is that optimal bodily health is impossible without that spiritual health that results from repentance and forgiveness. And when it comes to illness and disease, forgiveness serves to facilitate our healing while simultaneously shielding us from those avoidable illnesses that beset us as a direct consequence of our sin.