Coffee With God

Reflection: Mark 8:14-21

Today’s Gospel brings up a warning against the yeast of the Pharisees and Herodians. Mark was writing his text of the Gospel for the Catechumens in Rome. He wanted to communicate a specific message to those who were receiving baptism and coming into Faith: The Good News of Jesus spreads and multiplies. But not everything that multiplies is good news! In the previous chapters Mark portrayed the Pharisees as hypocrites and power-mongers. In every miracle story of Jesus, there were some opposing voices from the religious leaders. They opposed forgiveness of God. Observation of Sabbath was imposed as a burden on people; they sought recognition in public places. They were jealous of the extraordinary powers and popularity that Jesus was gaining. Jealousy, hypocrisy, and all the evil tendencies, work like yeast, and contaminate the society. Mark’s sense of the leaven of Herod had been masterfully outlined in his dramatisation of the execution of John the Baptist. Herod wanted political security at any cost and could not accept criticism. He valued personal “honour” more than the life of another. To look good was more important than to do good and doing good was irrelevant. He could feast and make merry while his subjects were exploited beyond endurance. Mark’s reference to the one loaf of bread with the disciples, on the boat out on the waters was significant. The boat was perhaps a symbol of Mark’s community on mission. Within the community of disciples there was to be only one loaf, the leaven of God – that is Jesus. It was spectacularly more than enough for everyone, Jew and Gentile. Later in the narrative, Jesus would take a loaf in his hands and invite his disciples to eat it, declaring it to be his body broken for all. In Jesus’ mind Eucharist would be the celebration of the all-inclusive vision of God, of God’s universal offer of forgiveness and of life to the full. The Eucharistic bread would allow no place for the leaven of Pharisees or of Herod. The new wave of the pandemic is forcing the closure of churches, depriving the faithful of access to sacraments. In these moments of trials, pay attention to the warning in today’s Gospel: Let’s not be deceived by the leaven of the modern-day herodians – political power centres that keeps the faithful away from the life of the Church. Mark recorded Jesus’ profound sadness that even the disciples had not understood the mind of Jesus. Yet Jesus did not withdraw from his mission. He continued to work with his hard-hearted disciples. In spite of all their limitations, he loved them, had hope in them. Let us be united around the life-giving Word and the bread on board – the Word of God and the Eucharist in the Church.