Weekly Bible Commentaries, Claretian Communications

Sunday, September 7, 2003
23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time

Readings:
Is 35: 4-7 The Lord is Salvation
Responsorial Psalm 145: 7-10
James 2: 1-5 Make no distinctions between people
Mk 7: 31-37 Healing a deaf mute in the land of Gentiles

The prophet Isaiah is the prophet of consolation. Amid the suffering created by exile, the people needed a voice of encouragement and hope, which is why the prophet invites them to have the courage "not to be afraid". It is necessary to trust in God because he will save his people from slavery.

Through his words, the prophet evokes the memory of the land of Palestine with its natural resources, streams and springs; a fertile and spacious land, a paradise or promised land which awaits them after exile; the one to which they will return as if in a new exodus. They will become established once again in this land and rebuild the Temple, the city and their history.

They will live in plenitude, full of life and health, with all of their senses, able to perceive what is happening around them. The strength of God can be discovered in the words of the prophet, who seeks to encourage the disheartened and transform the devastated land. The prophet spoke of so many good things that it seemed that the messianic times had arrived.

The letter of James is a strong appeal for fraternity. Those who make distinctions between people in the assembly, that is, in the liturgical celebration, cannot be Christian. St. James speaks to us about differences and inequalities within the community itself, paradoxically in the place where another model must be built which indicates the relationship that human beings should create in society. In short: fraternity, as fruit of the commandment to love, begins in the liturgical celebration itself and should be a reality in the social relations of the members of the community.

Every time a Christian celebrates the eucharist, s/he should take on a commitment to true love, a love made real in the works that enrich life and fill it with a humanizing content. This is a task we must take on in order to make the Christian celebration a place for abundant life and an experience of deep love. Today's gospel tells us that the pagans were also objects of the proclamation of the Kingdom of God by Jesus. That leaving the region of Tyre once again, Jesus headed for Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, around the edges of Decapolis, all in pagan territory. They brought him a deaf mute and asked him to lay his hand upon him. It is one of the few times we see Jesus outside his country; if we believe the gospels, Jesus basically did not travel into foreign lands. It is important to point out that at that time, going to a "foreign land" also meant going into the "world of the pagans"...not like today. In this section of the gospel of Mark we see Jesus amidst people of another religion... His behavior towards people who do not believe in the God of Abraham as he does could be very significant for us...Truly.

First of all we see how Jesus does not have an "apostolic" attitude among the gentiles or pagans; we do not see him concerned about catechizing them. Nor does he seem concerned about doing religious proselytism among them: he doesn't try to convert anyone to his religion, the Israelite faith in the God of Abraham. Nor do we see Jesus take advantage of his trip to "teach doctrine", "spread the holy maxims of his religion". What's more, we see that he does not even preach, does not make religious speeches. Rather, he simply "cures". In other words, not theory but practice. Deeds, not words. We can't say that Jesus goes through the pagan territory with indifference, or with his eyes closed, as if he had no business there...On the contrary, we can say that he thinks he doesn't have much to say. We don't see him making speeches or giving his "service of the word", but rather curing and healing. He doesn't talk about the Kingdom (which is his "profession" and even his "obsession" inside Israel); outside his religious territory he is silent about the Kingdom and "does Kingdom". Or as the people who see him say, "he does good", and does not talk about goodness. (And we already know that "ubi bonum, ibi Regnum", "where good is done, the Kingdom of God is present").

If we look carefully, although Jesus does not preach in that pagan region, he does "ev-angelize" in the strict sense of the word: he gives the good news ("eu-angelo"). He doesn't report on it or try to share "salvific knowledge", or even to "give signs", but rather to make present, perform acts that in themselves are "good news". Practical "evangelization", without theory or words. (We are not rejecting theory, doctrine, theology or the word, nor do we think that Jesus would ever have done so; what we are trying to say after observing Him, is that for us, as well as for Him, those aspects take a "second" place; the first place is for Life, for action, for the Goodness that identifies the Kingdom, not for the word that announces it). This is an excellent lesson for these times of religious pluralism and interreligious dialogue. Maybe our historic apostolic and missionary zeal for the "conversion of unbelievers", for "calling Gentiles to Christian faith", for "Christianizing nations with another religion", or for the "expansion of the Church" or its "introduction into other geographic areas"...should look at Jesus and notice his peculiar missionary behavior.

Maybe today, like Jesus, we need to be silent more and simply act. That is, to dialogue interreligiously, beginning-as it is usually expressed technically-with the "dialogue of life": join with others and unite our efforts to build Life (creating good-"ibi Regnum"-). Because if we can be united in the building of the "Kingdom of God" (no matter what name we give to it) we will in fact be united in the adoration (practice) of the God of the Kingdom. Doctrine, dogma and theology will follow. And it will come down like ripe fruit, when dialogue is a tangible reality in the practice of daily life.

"He did everything well, he evens makes the deaf hear and the mute speak"; perhaps verse 37 is a poor translation or a derivative of the exclamation that more likely burst forth from those who observed Jesus' behavior: "He did all the good [that he could], even making the deaf hear and the mute speak". In other words, Jesus did preach to the gentiles but with the language of actions, not asking for a conversion to his religion or to a new Church that he had no intention of founding, but instead sharing his "conversion to the Kingdom" with them.

The Christian missionary's mission takes its example from Jesus. The missionary-all of us in certain circumstances-should not seek the conversion of the "gentiles" to the Church as a primary goal, but rather their conversion to the Kingdom (with whatever name is appropriate). And it is clear that this conversion is not a theoretical dialogue or doctrinal preaching but rather a "dialogue of life" and of building of the Kingdom.

Examining our Lives

"He did everything well" or "He did all the good he could". Whatever the original sense of the expression Mark placed on the lips of the people observing Jesus, it is still a good motto, an expression that could adequately symbolize our best ideal. Do I match its level?

For the Community Gathering

-Before Vatican II in more than just a few places, the Church had first, second and third class weddings, masses and funerals, with more or less decoration of the temple, even with greater or fewer celebrants...according to the fees paid for the ceremonies. Also, in officially Catholic countries, government officials had a place of honor reserved for them.

Fortunately, all of that has been done away with today. Has the classification of people, the preference for the rich and disparagement of the poor, of whom James speaks to us in his letter, been eliminated in the Church? In what new or old ways can the Church today have "preference for people in favor of the rich?

-The prophet Isaiah presents God as the one who comes to open the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf, the one who will make the lame jump with joy and the mute sing. And by associating today's first reading with the third, the liturgy is trying to tell us that Jesus fulfills and gives plenitude to what the Old Testament prophets dreamed of as the one sent by God. Twenty centuries later, with completely different and technical medicine, most of us do not believe in miraculous physical "healings" (mindful of the large number of Christians, mostly charismatic, who do believe in physical cures through religious acts). But for those of us who have a more "realistic" or secularized or scientific mind...what reading can we make of the prophet's announcement and of Jesus' miracle working? What does Jesus untying the mouth of a mute mean for us TODAY? St. Francis Xavier went to the East Indies to dedicate his life to the conversion of the gentiles, in the conviction that if they did not know the message of the gospel they could not be saved. This conviction remained fixed in large sectors of Christians until the 1960's. Missionary activity generated by this supposition had a motivation and a spirituality that cannot be sustained today. "Missions" have meaning but no longer have the meaning they once had. One type of mission has died and must continue to die, while another type of mission continues to have meaning. Let's try to factually describe those two types of missions.

For the Prayer of the Faithful