In his public life, Jesus travels a lot. His school is itinerant, a sign that life with him is a journey, and that his disciple must follow him. The Gospel also speaks of the women who follow him. "had followed" and, therefore, they were his disciples. It is surprising to see that Jesus does not want it to be known that he passes through Galilee. It was his homeland, that of his family and that of most of his disciples. Perhaps because he does not want interruptions in his journey? Or because he does not want to feel again like a despised prophet in his homeland? Or because he knows that his own people have not yet taken that inner leap, have not understood the first announcement of his defeat, death and resurrection, nor the reproach he made to Peter when he objected: "Depart from me Satan."and you want to dedicate yourself to them?
Then, for the second time, he announces the end of his mission, so different from his expectations: "The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill Him; and after He is dead, after three days He will rise again.". The disciples still do not understand anything of this mystery, so distant from their perspective.
Since we are Christ's disciples, it helps us to meditate often on the models presented to us in the Gospel: they did not understand anything, they argued about who was the greatest, they betrayed him, they denied him, they all fled. Here too they are afraid to question him, lest they be reproached like Peter. It is difficult to do worse. Perhaps the word of God tells us these things to encourage us, and the evangelists do not hide and do not lie. We are also comforted to see Jesus who, with all the power of his word, fails to get inside those hard heads. He trusts in the intimacy of the house of Capernaum to try to continue the dialogue. But, even protected by the walls of their house, the disciples do not have the courage to say what they were discussing on the road. They were thinking about who should lead their group when Jesus died, as he had already predicted to them twice. They feel that such a discussion is not good and, therefore, they keep silent. This time Jesus does not scold, but takes the opportunity to teach again. With calm and lapidary words: if anyone wants to be a leader in the church, at any level, he must be the last of all and the servant of all.
And immediately afterwards, Mark, as the only one among the Synoptics, describes the gesture of Jesus' embrace of a child, whom he shows to the disciples as the object of his attention and indirectly as a model. He encourages them to welcome the children in his name: because in this way they welcome Jesus and the Father who sent him. Caring for them will help them to forget the allure of power. The children were among the last: those who want to be the first among Jesus' disciples must also do the same.
The homily on the readings of Sunday 33rd Sunday
The priest Luis Herrera Campo offers its nanomiliaa small one-minute reflection for these readings.
