HAVING WORKED with a priest colleague who was also a doctor, and our having remained close friends for many years, St Luke’s Day always strikes a special chord with me. And one way or another I’ve had cause to witness some of the brightest and best doctors and nurses about their work in the last few months. I am especially mindful today of the debt of gratitude owed to carers and to physicians who are sensitive to the needs of individual – and therefore profoundly different – human beings. The well-chosen word of encouragement, and of humane understanding, proves every bit as important as surgical skill or the correct administration of prescribed medicines.

Healers are important. We all need healing. And healing in our own lives is a grace that often comes to us, all unawares, when we ourselves are instruments of healing for others – the speaker of the well-chosen word, the provider of the hug, a bit of ordinary but oh-so-important warmth. And this kind of “healing ministry” is needed by every human person we ever encounter. There’s always a need for it. Right in front of our own noses. Right in the inner depths of our own hearts. In our schools and offices and factories, in our meetings and churches and homes, and those of our neighbours. Like food and drink. There’s always a need for the healing touch. It’s not just the work of those who care for the medically ill. It’s the vocation of all humanity. And by the good offices of St Luke the Physician, among others, we know that Jesus of Nazareth was and is an exemplar of that kind of empowering touch, that kind of humane compassion, that kind of healing, that kind of communion of souls, that kind of understanding, for old and young, female and male alike. And so we know what the Church is really for …