Thought for Sunday Homily

We may ask what is special in this gospel ? Unless we see this event with the eyes of faith we may not find anything special in it. And the speciality is, the moment in which Peter and other apostles recognise in Jesus the Messiah, there begins the kingdom of God. This small group is the mustard seed which will give origin to the gigantic tree. This fact changes the whole content of the preaching of Jesus. No more this group longs for the food that perishes but from now on they long for the food that lasts for eternal life. And from this moment Jesus occupies himself in the formation of this particular group which will be head of his church. It means the Christian life begins with faith and recognising in Jesus the promised Messiah. Church cannot be church as long as it is worried about the food that perishes. Unfortunately the same thoughts which the crowd entertained about Jesus exists until today in the hearts of vast majority of Christians.

Once you recognise who is Jesus for you – begins your journey of faith. And once Jesus recognises in you the required faith He begins reforming your life as he began reforming the life of apostles. But what is the first step of this formation ? "And he began to teach them that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the elders, and by the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed…". The first step is "the Cross". He makes them to understand that the life which they embraced is not a way to success or to power, but an existence which will be full of fatigue, suffering and obscurity. A path which is full of thorns and thistles.

Thought for Sunday homily

Jesus Heals the Deaf and Blind (Mark 7:31-37)

AM I DEAF?
In today’s Gospel reading we enter into a central part of Mark’s Gospel. The section begins with the healing of a deaf man and ends with the healing of a blind man. These are not just miracle stories about Jesus’ power but have a teaching purpose. Jesus has just been in the Gentile area of Tyre and Sidon (on the Mediterranean coast in modern Lebanon) and has moved on to the area of the Decapolis (Ten Towns), on the east bank of the Jordan River. It was basically a Gentile, a non-Jewish area.
There a man is brought for Jesus to heal. He was deaf, that is, he could not hear and he had an impediment in his speech, that is, he could not speak properly.
Today we are consoled by human and technological advancements can address impairments of hearing.
But the big impairment we experience in our life today is the spiritual impairment.
Spiritual deafness shutting our ears to God who speaks to us. Sometimes we go on with our sinful ways of life as if we didn’t hear anything from God. He wants to heal our spiritual deafness. Am I ready? Am I deaf?
What can I do?
We have to seek out Jesus, go off with Him, away from the crowd, and spend time in His healing presence.So, let us pray today for the gift of hearing, to hear the voice of God calling to us in everything that will happen this day. Let us pray for the gift of speech, that is, to be so filled with the liberating experience of knowing Jesus that we simply cannot refrain from sharing that experience with all those around us.

ONAM GREETINGS!!