Join the Jesuit Institute South Africa as they celebrate Sunday Mass for the
4th Sunday Ordinary Time 2021 - Year B
This morning's Mass is celebrated by Fr Bruce Botha SJ.
Owing to COVID-19 and the suspensions of Mass in various parts of the country, we invite everyone to make a 'Spiritual Communion' with us during this Mass. More resources are available at [ Ссылка ].
Our readings for this Mass are:
First Reading Deuteronomy 18:15-20
Psalm Psalm 95:1-9
Second Reading 1 Corinthians 7:32-35
Gospel Acclamation Matthew 4:16
Gospel Mark 1:21-28
Homily (begins at 13:26)
What is crucial to our understanding of today’s gospel is the use of personal pronouns, and who is using them.
The evil spirit, when addressing Jesus, uses the plural pronoun “us” to refer to itself. “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?” A verse later he uses the singular, “I”, as in “I know who you are, the Holy One of God.”
For a moment let’s unpack what this might mean.
The confusion of personal pronouns by the evil spirit indicates that while there is one body, there are actually two minds vying for control of this man. In other encounters with people possessed of evil spirits, we are told how these spirits try to harm the person by throwing them into the fire, making them collapse, and so on. This two-mindedness, these opposing forces fighting for control of the man, and yes, of ourselves too, always leads to some kind of hurt or destruction.
This experience of being controlled by other desires, by the deeper and maybe darker side of ourselves, is not a new insight. If you have ever felt deeply divided in yourself about who you are, who you want to be, and the actual behaviours that you exhibit, you are not alone. We need to look no further than St Paul writing to the Romans, in Ch 7, where he confesses to not doing the good that he wants and that he continues doing the evil that he does not want to do.
It’s true that sometimes good people do bad things, and also true that sometimes bad people do good things. It is exceptionally rare that someone good is consistently good, that everything which they say and do is of a piece when no part of their life is in contradiction to any other part.
Jesus is one such person, and I believe that this is what so impressed his audience. We are told that he “taught with authority, not like the scribes.” Remember that the scribes and Pharisees were condemned for being hypocrites, and for making laws that oppressed people rather than liberated them.
His authority was his authenticity, his integrity. People believed him and respected him because his values, words, and actions were all in alignment. Jesus did not have a private set of values that were different from the values he proclaimed publicly.
Put differently, neither his heart nor his mind was divided. He was single-minded in his focus on God his father. In this, he was following the command of God given to the Israelites in Deuteronomy, which was to love God with all his heart and mind and soul and strength. This command to wholehearted love can seem a little daunting, and we can wonder where the space is to love others or even ourselves. This command seems more suited for the angels and saints, not us ordinary mortals.
In the gospel of Luke, we are told the story of Jesus being asked which of the commandments was the greatest. Jesus said that it was the commandment to love God wholeheartedly, and then, without prompting, he told them that there was a second commandment just like the first, and it was to love one’s neighbour.
In other words, we love God best when we are loving our brothers and sisters, when we are working to make the world a better, more just, and loving place. God does not ask us to choose between loving partners or children but to love God through our love for them.
When we are able to love in this way when we are loving as Jesus did, then I believe we are more able to live lives of integrity and authenticity, lives in which our values, words, choices, and actions are all in alignment.
You can listen to this homily at
[ Ссылка ]
or download it to read here,
[ Ссылка ]
