Homily by Father Emmanuel Schwab

4rd Sunday During the Year – Year B

1st reading: Deuteronomy 18,15-20

Psalm: 94 (95),1-2, 6-7abc, 7d-9

2rd reading: 1 Corinthians 7,32-35

Gospel: Mark 1,21-28

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As the Book of Exodus describes the manifestation of God among his people, when God gives Moses the words of the Covenant, we can understand that the people are afraid. What is described looks very much like a volcanic eruption... And what we hear in this passage from the book of Deuteronomy: “I no longer want to hear the voice of the Lord my God, I no longer want to see this great flame, I do not want to die! » is not the expression of a rejection of God but of a fear of the way in which God manifests himself. Moses is the one chosen to bridge this distance between God and the people, to dare to approach, and then transmit the words of God to the people. And today we hear this promise from God: The Lord will raise up a prophet like me, said Moses, and you will listen to it. This is one of the many announcements of the Messiah in the Holy Scriptures.

The passage from Mark's Gospel that we heard is at the very beginning of the Gospel. The Gospel of Mark begins with an evocation of the proclamation of John and the baptism of the Lord, then an evocation of the preaching of Jesus which repeats that of John, and the call of the first four disciples.

Until then, no man has been heard speaking to Jesus. Immediately follows what we read today: Jesus who returns on a Sabbath day to the synagogue in Capernaum, and he teaches. The first thing is this surprise that he teaches “with authority”. And what makes Jesus teaches with authority, is that there is no distance in him between what he is, what he lives and what he says, since he himself is the Word of God. He himself is the word of God. He is not an instrument through which God speaks like a megaphone: he is in all his divine person the word of the Father. A man gets up and starts shouting: “What do you want from us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to ruin us? I know who you are: You are the Holy One of God.” This is a first apparent profession of faith: “I know who you are, you are the Holy One of God”. This is not false; it's even true. But why does Jesus silence him? Jesus silences him because it is not a confession of faith in the sense of an act of trust in Jesus sent by the Father. Jesus reveals that this apparent profession of faith is in fact demonic. " "Silence ! Get out of this man.” The impure spirit caused him to convulse.. This impure spirit spoke the truth when he said that Jesus is the Holy One of God, but he says it in such a way that he wants to worry man: You came to ruin us.

This impure spirit is often at work in our lives... Who has never been afraid of what God might ask of them? Who has never been afraid that God's commandments will take them too far or require too much renunciation or too much effort? Who, deep down, has never heard within his heart these words of the impure spirit: What do you want from us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to ruin us? And we all carry a knowledge of Jesus that is both true and at the same time suspicious. We all need to let ourselves be stripped of the impure spirit that makes us fear Jesus.

Thérèse is obviously a model of a woman freed from this impure spirit. His last letter, in the form of an image representing the hands of the priest who raises the host and where is written next to it: I cannot fear a God who, for me, has made himself so small, he is only love and mercy.

Everything happens as if Mark, in writing his Gospel, begins by alerting us to the fact that we approach the Gospel with false ideas about Jesus and that we must let ourselves be purified by Jesus so that Jesus can reveal himself in a renewed way. to us, in the truth of his being; and that he reveals himself to us as Savior.

In this liturgical year we resume a more or less continuous reading of the Gospel of Mark. Let us make it a habitual reading and take the time during this year to read and reread the Gospel of Mark in its entirety in this desire that the Lord reveals himself more to us; or, to use the way in which Saint Paul summarizes what happened on the road to Damascus – he does so in the Letter to the Galatians (1,16:XNUMX) where he says: “When it pleased the Father to reveal his Son in me” —, it is a prayer that we could pray: “Father reveal your Son in me. »

In the second reading, we heard this passage from Saint Paul to the Corinthians which, at a time when we await the coming of the Lord in glory quite soon, invites us to remain in the state in which we are and shows all the advantages that there can be in being entirely in the service of the Lord without having the worry of a family. But for 2000 years, the Church has deepened the mystery of the presence of Christ and the path to holiness, and Christians have seen that it is possible to remain undividedly attached to the Lord, while living the sacrament of marriage. And there are only the holy spouses Louis and Zélie Martin as examples to remind us that it is possible in marriage to belong to the Lord without sharing. And it is interesting to see how they really based their relationship on Jesus, and how they lived their marital and parental love in the Lord, without division.

But how to read the Gospel? The Gospel is real food. For this, we must always read it in an act of faith where we ask the Holy Spirit to open our intelligence and our heart so that we can let ourselves be taught by him. Thérèse makes the Gospel her primary nourishment, and the more she advances in her life as a Carmelite, the more the Gospel takes an important place. She writes :

If I open a book composed by a spiritual author (even the most beautiful, the most touching), I immediately feel my heart tighten and I read without, so to speak, understanding, or if I understand, my mind stops without being able to meditate... In this helplessness Holy Scripture and Imitation come to my aid; in them I find solid and pure food. But above all it is the Gospel that sustains me during my prayers, in it I find everything that is necessary for my poor little soul. (Ms A, 83 r° and v°)

This is what we must seek to live: to explore the Gospel to find what truly nourishes us.

And Pope Francis, in his Exhortation “It's confidence” on Saint Thérèse, which he published on October 15, gives what, in his eyes, is the key to the way in which Thérèse reads the Gospel. He writes this:

The act of love “Jesus, I love you”, continually experienced by Thérèse as a breath, is the key to her reading of the Gospel. She immerses herself with this love in all the mysteries of the life of Christ, of which she becomes contemporary, inhabiting the Gospel with Mary and Joseph, Mary Magdalene and the Apostles. With them, she penetrates the depths of the love of the Heart of Jesus. Let's take an example: “When I see Madeleine advance in front of the numerous guests, watering with her tears the feet of her adored Master, whom she touches for the first time; I feel that her heart has understood the depths of love and mercy of the Heart of Jesus and that, sinner as she is, this Heart of love is not only willing to forgive her, but also to lavish on her the benefits of its intimacy divine, to elevate it to the highest summits of contemplation. (#34)

Well, brothers and sisters, let us ask the Holy Spirit for this grace to be delivered from the impure spirit that would make us fear the Lord Jesus. But on the contrary, let us ask the Holy Spirit to make our love for Jesus grow within us, so that we can, by meditating on the Gospels, let the Lord teach us and reveal to us that he is only love and mercy.

Amen