X Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year B

Where are you? Outside or inside? Lost or found?

“Whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven.”
Mark 3:20-35

After the Lenten and Easter seasons and the festivities of Pentecost, the Holy Trinity, and Corpus Christi, we now resume the Sundays of Ordinary Time, which we had interrupted at the beginning of Lent. We are on the tenth Sunday. In this liturgical year of “cycle B”, we are accompanied by the Gospel of Saint Mark. We resume from the third chapter.

After the arrest of John the Baptist, Jesus began his ministry, announcing the good news of the Kingdom and inviting conversion. He travels throughout the region of Galilee but establishes his residence in Capernaum, in the house of Peter and James. His prophetic preaching, accompanied by signs/miracles of liberation, arouses the enthusiasm of the crowds but also provokes suspicion and opposition from the religious and political authorities. Jesus is too free a rabbi, he does not respect the “rules”, he does not observe the Sabbath, he associates with tax collectors and sinners… In short, he is a threat to the religious and political elite, so they plan to eliminate him (Mark 3:6). His relatives are worried and come down from Nazareth to Capernaum “to take charge of him; for they said, ‘He is out of his mind.’”

The intervention of Jesus’ family frames the central theme of today’s Gospel, which is the conclusion of the investigation by the scribes sent from Jerusalem: “He is possessed by Beelzebul and by the prince of demons he drives out demons.” Jesus calls them to himself and, with parables, tries to open their eyes to the newness of what was happening. He concludes by saying, “Truly I tell you, people will be forgiven for all their sins and all the blasphemies they utter; but whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven; they are guilty of an eternal sin.” The passage ends with the arrival of his family, who, “standing outside, sent someone in to call him.” At this point, Jesus announces his belonging to a new family born from listening to the Word: “Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”

Where are you?

Let’s approach the Gospel passage starting from the first reading and, concretely, from the first question God asks man after sin: “Where are you?”. This question, seemingly unnecessary because God knows well where I am, is a key question, fundamental for becoming aware of our existential reality. It is a question that God poses to every man and woman of all times.

Generally, we avoid asking ourselves this question, we dodge it. To avoid hearing it, we fill our lives with noise to drown it out. Because silence scares us! To avoid hearing it, we fill our schedule with things to do, even good deeds. Because having nothing to do unsettles us! To avoid hearing it, we live our lives projected outward. Because the encounter with our inner self frightens us! To avoid hearing it, we conform to common thinking. Because taking on our responsibility seems too risky! To avoid hearing it, we anesthetize ourselves with carefree entertainment, with the pleasures of life, and our little “drugs”!

Where are you? However, this question persists and does not give up, no matter how weak it may seem. It emerges, even suddenly, and does not let us live superficially! It is a questioning that seems to haunt us and does not leave us in peace. When ignored, it hides behind our dissatisfaction, the feeling of always being out of place, the unease about the meaning of life, and the bitterness that criticizes everything and everyone!…

The blasphemy against the Holy Spirit

But there is a moment when, due to our obstinacy in silencing this voice, it becomes silent forever. The person shuts themselves off, refuses to be questioned, and identifies their particle of truth with the absolute truth. Could this also be a mode of that troubling “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit” that Jesus speaks of in today’s Gospel? It is a dramatic situation because Light is called darkness, Truth is called falsehood, and God is called Satan. It is an unforgivable sin because the person seals themselves in their pretension of self-sufficiency. We should not think that such a circumstance is improbable or exceptional. In reality, it is a very current situation. Its manifestations are varied: in fake news, in envy that denigrates or slanders others, in justifying hatred, in proclaiming “holy wars”, in deafness to the cry of the poor, in justifying injustice under the pretext of the right to private property or the legality of an unjust economic system!…

This “blasphemy against the Holy Spirit” is not something that happens overnight. It is an imperceptible sliding into existential falsehood, a progressive habituation to evil, or the corruption of one’s conscience.

How to evaluate “where we are”?

Today’s Gospel suggests criteria for evaluating “where we are”. Indeed, it speaks of three groups of people who approach Jesus: the scribes who have already judged and condemned Jesus in their hearts; the relatives of Jesus who “went out to take charge of him” and who, “standing outside, sent someone in to call him”; and finally, those “who were sitting around him” and whom Jesus defines as his true family, “because whoever does God’s will is my brother and sister and mother.”

The three groups suggest three sets of questions for our reflection:

1) What could be my slips into falsehood? What are my habits in certain faults or weaknesses that I tend to minimize or justify? Answering the question “Where are you?” means recognizing and confessing our real situation.

2) Where am I? Am I “outside”, on the threshold of the door, perhaps making claims before the Lord because “he belongs to us”? Or am I “inside” in the circle of his new family that listens and does the will of the Father? Let’s not take the answer for granted, because there are those who believe they are inside and are outside and those who seem outside and are inside, as is the case of Jesus’ mother in the group of relatives. The case of the two sons in the parable of the prodigal son can be an eloquent example.

3) We could consider another situation in which everyone, in a certain sense, finds themselves at some moments in life’s journey. There are those who are “outside” and those who are “inside”, but there are also those who are absent, far away, lost in the many meanders of life. We are all either lost or found. However, it is not easy to recognize before ourselves and others that we are lost. We lack the courage to recognize ourselves as a “lost sheep”. So we hide behind a beautiful facade, behind a role or a mask. Maybe we try to find our way back on our own, without asking for help, and we find ourselves more and more entangled. The only real way out is to cry out to the Lord like the psalmist: “I have gone astray like a lost sheep; seek your servant” (Psalm 119:176).

To conclude…

I would like to quote a reflection by Martin Buber (a philosopher and theologian of Jewish origin) on God’s question “Where are you?”.

“Adam hides so as not to have to account for himself, to escape the responsibility of his own life. Thus every man hides because every man is Adam and in Adam’s situation. To escape the responsibility of the life he has lived, existence is transformed into a mechanism of hiding. By hiding in this way and persisting always in this hiding ‘before the face of God’, man slides ever more, and ever more deeply, into falsehood. In this way, a new situation is created which, day by day and hiding by hiding, becomes increasingly problematic. It is a situation that can be characterized with extreme precision: man cannot escape the eye of God but, in trying to hide from Him, he hides from himself. Even within himself, he certainly retains something that seeks him, but he makes it increasingly difficult for this something to find him. And it is precisely in this situation that God’s question catches him: it wants to disturb man, destroy his hiding mechanism, make him see where a wrong path has led him, awaken in him a burning desire to get out of it.” (The Way of Man).

Fr. Manuel João Pereira Correia mccj
Verona, June 2024

The cost of being a disciple of Jesus today

Mark 3:20-35

In the gospels there are many different images and titles used to describe Jesus. He spoke about himself as being the Good Shepherd, the Bread of life and the Light of the World; just to name a few. However, this Sunday there is a description of him in the gospel with which we are not too familiar, but it is very clearly stated. The crowd of people is so big that Jesus is not even able to have a meal. When his family hear this, ‘they set out to take charge of him, convinced he was out of his mind.’ If we said this today about someone, it would not exactly a compliment!

Through the way he lived and spoke, Jesus offered the people of his time and us today a message and set of values that are very radical and challenging. He did and said a lot of things that were not popular or acceptable according to the Jewish Law of the time. He went out of his way to be with people who were seen as sinners and outcasts. He spent time and ate with tax collectors. He publically spoke to and deliberately touched those who were sick, even lepers. He made time to be with and welcomed women into his company. We think of the woman who touched the hem of his garment, the woman who anointed him with oil and the woman he met at the well. So obvious was his unusual and radical behaviour that the Pharisees pointed their finger at him to publically condemn and criticise him. As far as they were concerned, Jesus was certainly out of his mind and as we just heard, even his family were concerned about him.

The message and life Jesus are very radical and demanding, even for us today. We are asked to follow a man who loved us so much that he gave himself to us at a meal, who bent as low as a slave to wash our feet and who then gave his life for us on a cross.  To follow Jesus and the example of his life calls for great courage and conviction on our part. There is always the danger that people might think that we too are out of our minds if say we are following Jesus.

On March 24th this year a gunman took and held hostages in supermarket in France, even killing some of them. A police man, called Arnaud Beltrame freely offered to take the place of the remaining hostages. In the end he gave his own life to save others. He was described as showing exceptional courage and selflessness as he sacrificed himself to save these people.  Jesus said, No one can have greater love than to lay down their lives for their friends. This police man did not even know any of the people he died for and saved.

Was he out his mind as well like Jesus? Or did he have the courage of his convictions and faith to live and die as Jesus has shown us? 

Michael Moore OMI