Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Yr B. Jan. 21, 2024. (Sunday of the Word of God)
Readings
1st: Jonah 3:1-5, 10
2nd: II Corinthians 7:29-31
Gospel: Mark 1:14-20
Theme: Repent And Believe The Good News (Gospel)
My dear people of God, today is Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Yr B. This Sunday is declared by the Holy Father, Pope Francis I, to be specially devoted to "the celebration, study and dissemination of the Word of God. The celebration of this (particular) Sunday has an ecumenical value, since the scriptures point out, for those who listen, the path to authentic and firm unity...The various communities will find their own ways to mark this Sunday with a certain solemnity. It is important, however, that in the Eucharistic celebration the sacred text (Bible) to be enthroned, in order to fucus the attention of the assembly on the normative value of God's word" (Pope Francis, Aperuit Illis 3). Our reflections would focus on the Theme, the first optional prayer the Church recites as a minister signs us with blessed ashes on Ash Wednesday - Repent and believe in the Good News. It is paraphrased from the opening lines of today's Gospel. Starting from today our major gospel study for this Church year (B) will be St. Mark's Gospel, the shortest and most direct, clearest, and most energising of all the four Gospels. The carefully chosen words that compose the very first line of today's Gospel are so tremendous. In sharp contrast to the news of the circular world, Jesus preaches Good News - of the dawn of a new era, news of hope, news that brings people together and gives them enormous power to conquer sin of any kind and type. In essence, the Gospel Jesus preaches is not just merely spoken words but words that are personified in God's Incarnate Son in whom God appears as He really is. "To see me is to have seen the Father". Jesus begins with a crystal declaration that a time is fulfilled. By implication, a period has come for God to make good His messianic promises as foretold by the prophets in time past - The kingdom of God is at hand, indeed, arrived but waiting to be developed into full-fledged, for which you and I must repent, believe in the Good News and fully cooperate with it. If that development is not in full-fledged yet it is the reflection of the poor level of our cooperation. A good majority of Jesus' followers are only sorry for the consequences of their sins, that is, the mess they make, and NOT for their sins themselves. If they could sin without deleterious (harmful and damaging) consequences, they would be happy to continue sinning.
Merely abstaining from sin is not the repentance that Jesus preaches. Jesus demands a complete change of heart towards God, proven pragmatically by outward efforts to lead a good life. Jesus preached to the Jews to turn from their formalism in religion to a more sincere and honest worship and to greater weight to mercy, justice, fidelity to the covenant and openess to non-Jews. Repentance for the Gentiles demanded a complete turn from the worship of pagan idols to worship of one God. Our First Reading shows the great irony in God's sending a good but relunctant Jew (Jonah) to pagan Ninevites to preach the same repentance. "When God saw what the Ninevites did, how they turned from their evil way, (reprented) God (also) reprented (changed His mind positively) of the evil which He had said He will do to them". St. Paul is eloquently clear in our Second Reading on his call on the Christian community in Corinth to reject immoral behavior of any kind and type. At our own time repentance would mean an honest acknowledgement that over the years we have consciously entertained and allowed some unchristian attitudes and behaviors to dominate and even rule our lives. The attitude of slander, the untamed desire to tarnish and assassinate people's character and damage their reputation, the attitude of unpatriotic sense of duty, the attitude of tribal and religious discrimination and relegation, the attitude of gender violence, the attitude of clueless national policies by some of our leaders, the attitude of shameless loot and share governace, the attitude of depleting and destroying our forests and water bodies etc. Jesus emphatically calls for a complete change in these unchristian attitudes (repentance/conversion). Our personal response could either be a prolonged process or within a short period. It is important to note that repentance, another word for conversion, is private but not solitary. It can become communal, converting other people. Indeed, true repentance is "contagious/infectious" by nature. We see this clearly in the first four disciples of Jesus. At what looks like a casual invitation by Jesus, they turned to Him completely. Henceforth, their lives are never the same. Something permanently new has taken place in them. Through their personal response and repented lives, the Gospel has come down to you and I and is still permeating every available space of the world. No one truly responds to the invitation of Jesus and remains the same.
As we celebrate the Holy Father's call to study, celebrate and disseminate (spread) the Word of God, we pray for personal love of reading sacred scripture. May we become more serious in keeping and carrying personal Bibles. May the Word of God remain light to our feet and the gladness of our hearts. May the daily reading and meditating on God's Word truly touch our hearts and lead us through and to complete change (repentance). May the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in perfect peace. Continue to recite the Holy Rosary daily. God richly bless you and your family.
Rev. Fr. Thomas L. Debuo - Catholic Diocese of Damongo, Ghana. (0244511306/0243711926)