Most Reverend Vincent Long Van Nguyen OFM Conv DD STL, Bishop of Parramatta
Homily for the 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year B
Readings: Isaiah 35:4-7; Psalm 145(146):7-10; James 2:1-5; Mark 7:31-37
8 September 2024
Encountering God at the peripheries of life
Dear friends,
Pope Francis is presently making the longest and the most challenging trip of his papacy. True to his style of preferencing those who are on the periphery, he brings a message of hope, peace and unity to the people. In Indonesia, the largest Muslim country in the world, he joined the Grand Iman in calling for interfaith friendship and common goals, including fighting religious extremism and protecting our Common Home. Wherever he goes, the Holy Father embodies the Gospel message of love for humanity, especially the poor, the vulnerable and forgotten.
This message is not without controversy and even opposition. For example, only last week, he condemned those who systematically work to drive away migrants and refugees. He appealed for safe and legal avenues for people fleeing wars, violence, persecution and calamities, saying that “we will achieve it by fostering in every way a global governance of migration based on justice, fraternity and solidarity.”
The Word of God this Sunday teaches us that God has an eye for the outsiders and those who are in any way marginalised by society. God envisions a different way of being and relating for His people. Instead of being beholden to the trickle-down or winners-take-all system, we are called to be an alternative community that welcomes, protects and cares for the most vulnerable.
In Jesus, God champions the cause of the down and out, the socially insignificant, despised and excluded. Their rights become the object of God’s concern and action in the world. As we observe Jesus’ encounters and interactions with them, we are challenged to think outside the square, to question the social standards, to examine our own assumptions and ultimately to measure ourselves according to the expansive vision of God.
In the first reading, the prophet Isaiah comforts his people during the long and harrowing exile. Many of them have given up their ancestors’ faith and drifted away. Only a small group remains steadfast and these come to be known as the faithful remnants or the “Anawim”. They are not the former religious or political elites but often the poor, the dispossessed and the disadvantaged. Yet it is the “riff-raff” who are identified metaphorically by Isaiah as the blind, the deaf, the lame and the dumb are the ones chosen to rebuild Israel. It is the strength of their faith, endurance and steadfastness that makes God’s restorative vision possible. It is no wonder that they are seen as precursors embodying the spirit of the humble suffering Servant.
Isaiah’s messianic vision of a caring and viable society for the vulnerable still challenges us today. We have much to learn from our ancestors in faith. We must learn to be once again the Church that embodies God’s compassion, that ministers at the peripheries, that dares to love the unloved and include the excluded. In the words of St James, we must be a community that makes no “distinctions between the classes of people”.
The Gospel teaches us that God has an eye for the outsiders and those who are in any way marginalised by society. In Jesus, God champions the cause of the down and out: the tax collectors, the blind beggars, the lepers, the foreigners, the widows, the poor etc. Their rights become the object of God’s concern and action in the world.
In this Sunday’s episode, Jesus is presented as a boundary-breaking figure. Already in the opening words, the evangelist gives us an indication that the God of Jesus favours the lowly people, the outsiders or the untouchables. Jesus is found journeying through the Decapolis region. The Decapolis, meaning ten towns, is a mixed-race region with a bit of a rough reputation. Yet, surprisingly, Jesus discovers more openness to His ministry of preaching and healing in these non-Jewish people than He does among His own kin.
As He does to the tax collectors and sinners, He engages with the deaf person in a way that makes Himself vulnerable. He put His fingers into the person’s ears and touched his tongue with spittle. In Jesus, God comes into direct contact with the thresholds of human vulnerability and insecurity. He transforms them into openings of grace.
Brothers and sisters,
The Kingdom vision of Jesus guides us as we endeavour to embody God’s healing and restoration. We espouse a love that transcends borders and a social friendship that makes God’s plan for the world possible. As Jesus changed people for the better, through His encounters and interactions with them, let ours also affirm one another. Let His stance towards the weak and the excluded be our inspiration in addressing injustices wherever we see them. Pope Francis says in the Season of Creation, “If we do not take care of one another, starting with the least, with those who are most impacted, including creation, we cannot heal the world.” Let us follow the footsteps of Jesus as we listen and respond to the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor.
