Gospel Mk 6:1-6
Jesus departed from there and came to his native place, accompanied by his disciples. When the Sabbath came he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished. They said, “Where did this man get all this? What kind of wisdom has been given him? What mighty deeds are wrought by his hands! Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor except in his native place
and among his own kin and in his own house.” So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them. He was amazed at their lack of faith.
Homily
The Gospel story for this Sunday is a familiar story. Many of us achieve a certain amount of fame and success far away from home, in another country or another city and among other peoples, yet in our own country or city we are not recognized in the same way. This worries us.The truth is that the success we have achieved when we are away from our own home makes us aware of our own strengths. We also see the faults and failings of our own land very clearly and we would like to return and do something about it. We would like to make a contribution, to make a difference. The problem however is that those who have not left the country are accustomed to seeing things in a certain way and they very often do not see the problems of which we are aware. They do not see the need to change and so they do not share our enthusiasm and as the Gospel passage says “they take offense at us.” And they remind us lest we forget that we are no better than they are. They say of us as they said of Jesus; “Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary, and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” In this situation we must be content not to work any mighty deeds “apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them.”
This Gospel passage reminds us then of the need of all of us to be humble, to understand that change, both in the world outside of ourselves and indeed within ourselves only comes about slowly. The Messiah could not bring about dramatic change in his own hometown and not one of us is a Messiah. Nelson Mandela’s words resound with so much truth. “If people regarded me as a messiah they were living in a fool’s paradise. I have no miracles.” And so in spite of a few initiatives like the truth commission, life continues to be very hard for the majority of blacks in South Africa. “So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them.
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This Gospel passage has a very symbolic message for us, because if on the one hand, the Gospel speaks to us about our relationship with our own land, it also reminds us of the journey we must all make, at some stage in our lives, to that place deep within ourselves which is our true home.
Our life experience often takes us out of ourselves to live on a very superficial level. We do good things in life. People look at us and applaud the good that we do and we tend to forget who we truly are. For us in T&T, the successes of our athletes often fill us with euphoria, a euphoria often encouraged by politicians because the euphoria often makes forget the deep divisions and problems within our society which will not be healed overnight because our athletes have won a few trophies on the world stage. The healing of these problems will take time and constant effort.
The same thing gives in our personal lives. The effort to bring about the miracle of real change in our own lives is long and arduous. We do not work many miracles there. This experience keeps us humble and makes us aware of the need of God’s grace in our lives. We may be considered prophets by others but we are never prophets for ourselves. When we come to this understanding we are on the road to true wisdom.
Prayer
All powerful and ever-loving God we thank you for the lessons of this Gospel passage. You remind us of our need to be humble, to recognize that we are not messiahs and that we have to work patiently and perseveringly to bring about change in our own lives and in the lives of those around us. Help us to be content with laying our hands on a few people and curing them, understanding that in curing a few people we are in fact improving our world. We ask this through the intercession of Mary our Mother and your son Jesus. Amen
