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Jul
Jul
Reflection: Matthew 12:46-50
With this question, Jesus challenged his hearers to reflect on who are the members of their family, their relatives and loved ones. Then he sets a new criterion for the Family of God: “Whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother, sister, and mother” (v. 50). The challenge for the listeners was to be part of this new family. The concept of this Family of God became so strong a binding force for the community of disciples, especially after the Pentecost experience. They lived together as a family, sharing everything and was willing to sacrifice everything for the sake of their brothers, sisters – their now-found family. As the community grew in numbers, the missionaries who left their homes and natives for far off lands, because of their convictions that they were part of a family much larger than those based on blood-lines, religions and nationalities. The missionaries, in the history of the Church, set out in search of family members they did not yet know. If not for the efforts of those missionaries who came in search of the faces of their “unknown brothers and sisters,” this family of Jesus would have lacked the African faces, Latin American faces, Chinese and Japanese faces! In the Gospel, Jesus calls his listeners as his brother, sister and mother. And that invitation is for all those who listen to him even to this day. He gives us the invitation to be missionary disciples by sharing with others what Jesus did and said. He ate with sinners, assuring them that they too had a place at the Father’s table and the table of this world; he touched those considered to be unclean and, by letting himself be touched by them, he helped them to realize the closeness of God. During his Mass in the National Stadium in Bangkok in Thailand in 2019, Pope Francis said, this family of Jesus also include children and women who are victims of prostitution and human trafficking, young people enslaved by drug addiction and a lack of meaning, migrants, deprived of their homes and families, exploited fishermen and bypassed beggars. All of them are part of our family. They are our mothers, our brothers and sisters. Let us not deprive our communities of seeing their faces, their wounds, their smiles and their lives. Let us not prevent them from experiencing the merciful balm of God’s love that heals their wounds and pains. A missionary disciple knows that evangelization is not about gaining more members or about appearing powerful. Rather, it is about opening doors in order to experience and share the merciful and healing embrace of God the Father, which makes of us one family – the family of God.