Today’s Scripture Readings

Gospel Reading

NRSV

When they had crossed over, they came to land at Gennesaret and moored the boat. When they got out of the boat, people at once recognized him, and rushed about that whole region and began to bring the sick on mats to wherever they heard he was. And wherever he went, into villages or cities or farms, they laid the sick in the market-places, and begged him that they might touch even the fringe of his cloak; and all who touched it were healed.

The South African Dominican, Fr Albert Nolan OP coined the phrase the Upside-Down Messiah. Nolan broke open beautifully that on pretty well every page of the Scriptures, Jesus goes deliberately to the edge, to the liminal space and there encountered deeply the lost, the last, the least, the lame and the longing. Central to Catholic Social Justice teaching is the concept of preferential option for the poor – mirroring the daily choices and actions of Jesus. The poor, the Anawin of Yahweh, were close to the heart of Jesus and ultimately his siding with them cost them his life.
In this beautiful Gospel, we see the crowds flocking to Jesus. Finally, a prophet who personified the heart of the Old Testament. Finally, one who chose to put people before power, dignity before profit and service before self-satisfying ritual. This Gospel beautifully reflects what motivated Pope Leo to make the first Encyclical of his Pontificate, ‘Dilexi Te’ – I have loved you – on love of the poor and social justice. No wonder those very lost ones felt found when their hearts and eyes encountered him!

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