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Receivers
and proclaimers of a joyful message
VIII Sunday in
Ordinary Time
Year B -
26.02.2006
- Hosea
2:16-17.21-22
- Psalm
102
- 2Corinthians
3:1-6
- Mark
2,18-22
Reflections
The
practice of fasting among the Jews, with its fixed times and rituals,
gives Jesus
the occasion to give a more essential message. Fasting was a fairly
widespread
religious practice among the simple people, among those who guided the
people
(Moses, Elijah, Daniel...), and among the poor of Israel who
were
waiting for the Messiah (Simeon and Anna in Lk.2). Jesus himself fasted
in the
desert just before embarking on his public life, but later he distanced
himself somewhat from the official forms of fasting (Gospel).
Indeed,
he gave little weight to the accusation levelled against him of being a
glutton
and a drunkard (Mt.11:9) and to sit at table with publicans and sinners
(Mk.2:15-17; Lk.15:2).
There
are at least two important reasons that explain this moving away of
Jesus from
such a deeply-rooted spiritual tradition. First of all, Jesus reacts to
the
prevalent mentality of the time — and of the present — that the good
work of
fasting is the basis of merit and a right to be saved that can
be
claimed from God. Whereas Jesus wants to lead his disciples along a
path of
unselfishness. Even more: he wants to make it clear that the new
Messianic
times are already active, that the Kingdom is already present, that he
is the
Bridegroom who invites everyone into the banquet of new life (v.19),
where the
new wine of the definitive Alliance is offered freely. The feast has
begun and
all are invited: the only condition for taking part is to open one's
heart to
the gift, to be a new skin to receive the new wine of
God's
surprises, present in Jesus.
The
conversion proclaimed by Jesus at the beginning: “repent, and believe
in the
Good News” (Mk.1:15) means leaving the old, patched garment of the
ancient
habits, the sour and unsound wine of the past, to welcome the new wine
of the
newness of Christ (v.22), to believe in Him as the first disciples did
at the
wedding at Cana (Jn.2:11); to put on the festive garment of the
children and
brothers and sisters in the house of the Father of all. In this context
fasting, rather than an action to win God over to our side, becomes a
gesture of freedom from material things and of solidarity in sharing
with
others who are in need. Even today the
religious-ecclesiastical fasting
that is an act of solidarity must be freed of other kinds of
motivations:
fasting used as a political or ideological tool to put exert political
pressure, or for motives of hygiene or appearance, or for pure
asceticism.
The
motivation of the wedding feast of which Jesus speaks is profound. He
is the
Bridegroom of the new humanity. For its salvation he offers himself,
with total
love that never lessens despite the infidelities of the bride (sinful
humanity), as the prophet Hosea sings in the First Reading of the
obstinate
love of the husband for his unfaithful wife. “I will betroth you to
myself for
ever... with integrity and justice, with tenderness and love.”
(vv.21-22).
These are the five wedding presents that God gives as a
dowry to
his bride, to show her that He is able and determined to transform
'even
prostitutes into virgins', as St. Jerome puts it.
This
message has a power to regenerate that fills us with internal and
missionary
joy. As the well-known Fr. Tillich said: “We are often criticised, and
deservedly, of being gravediggers for a dead God rather than witnesses
of a
living God. We must acknowledge this criticism, and ask ourselves
whether our
lack of joy comes from the fact that we are Christians, or rather from
that
fact that we are not really so.” Pope John Paul II said that a
missionary is,
by vocation a man/woman of the Beatitudes. (*)
Even
Paul, in his arguments against his opponents, keeps the same topic in
mind when
writing to the Christians in Cornish (2nd Reading), trusting in
the
witness of their life as his best letter of recommendation (v.1);
indeed, he
calls them a "letter from Christ ...written not with ink but with the
Spirit of the living God ... on the tablets of your living hearts”
(v.3). The
communities were he result of Paul's missionary apostolate. He does not
attribute this to his own ability, because “our qualifications come
from God”
(v.6). This fact should fill us with joyful missionary energy: that we
are receivers
and, at the same time, proclaimers of a message that by its
very nature
is called Gospel, that is, Good News. As Catholics we are God's
letter of
presentation, the vehicle for his image and his message.
Hence, a
fundamental question hangs over us and our mission: what image, what
face of
God do we show to the world?
The Pope's words
The
missionary is a person of the Beatitudes. By living the
Beatitudes, the missionary experiences and shows concretely that the
kingdom of
God has already come, and that he has accepted it. The characteristic
of every
authentic missionary life is the inner joy that comes from faith. In a
world
tormented and oppressed by so many problems, a world tempted to
pessimism, the
one who proclaims the "Good News" must be a person who has found true
hope in Christ.
John Paul II
Encyclical
Redemptoris Missio (1990)
n. 91
In the steps of
missionaries
-
26/2/1885: An important date for the history of
Colonialism in Africa
and for the Missions: at the Berlin Conference (1884-1885) the European
powers
divide up the Continent of Africa among themselves.
-
27/2: Bl. Maria-Carità Brader (1860-1943), a Swiss nun who was a
missionary in
Ecuador and Colombia; she founded the Franciscan Sisters of Mary
Immaculate
with the two-fold charism of contemplation and action.
-
28/2: St. Auguste Chapdelaine, a priest of the Society of Overseas
Missions
(Paris), martyred in 1856 at Xilinxian in the Province of
Guangxi (China).
-
3/3: Bb. Liberato Weiss, Samuel Marzorati e Michele Pio Fasoli da Zerbo
,
Friars Minor who were martyred at Gondar (Ethiopia) in 1716.
-
3/3: St. Catherine Drexel, (born in Philadelphia, USA, 1858-1955);
Foundress.
She used her considerable inheritance to assist Afro-Americans through
around
60 schools and missions.
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Edited by Fr. Romeo
Ballan, mcci - Former Director of CIAM, Rome
Website:
www.ciam.org “Word for the Mission”
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