Today, we should consider our own life reflected in Bartimaeus: as he was, weary and "blind" by the roadside, so we too are facing our life. We suspect that this earthly life is not, in fact, the Life. And like him, we open ourselves to Jesus, by pleading "to see", because the man who only focuses on himself lets eternal Life run away.

Human life, because of sin, began to experience the burden of wretchedness in unremitting labor and unbearable sorrow, so that immortality is more of a burden than a blessing... There are moments, however, when, suddenly, we perceive "something" of what "Life" should be like. By contrast, what we call "life", in our everyday language is not real "life" at all.

—We want the blessed "Life" itself, the true one, but we have no idea what we ultimately desire. We do not know this reality at all, even in those moments when we think we can reach out and touch it. This unknown "reality" is the true hope which drives us. The term "Eternal Life" is intended to give a name to this known "unknown".