Today’s Scripture Readings

Gospel Reading

NRSV

Jesus went out again beside the lake; the whole crowd gathered around him, and he taught them. As he was walking along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, ‘Follow me.’ And he got up and followed him. And as he sat at dinner in Levi’s house, many tax-collectors and sinners were also sitting with Jesus and his disciples—for there were many who followed him. When the scribes of the Pharisees saw that he was eating with sinners and tax-collectors, they said to his disciples, ‘Why does he eat with tax-collectors and sinners?’ When Jesus heard this, he said to them, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners.’

Today’s Gospel brings to mind Pope Francis’ image for the church as a field hospital, with “the ability to heal wounds and to warm the hearts of the faithful”. As Jesus says, it’s those who know they are sick who realise they need the doctor. Reviled yet successful as a tax collector Levi, known to us as Matthew, the apostle, instantly recognises “the more” that Jesus is inviting him to. Pope Francis wrote that Jesus “looked at him with the eyes of mercy; he looked at him as no one had ever looked at him before”. And this look unlocked Matthew’s heart. It set him free; it healed him; it gave him hope; and a new life, “just as Jesus’ merciful gaze gives new life to men and women today”.

Pope Leo in “Dilexit te” (n.111) tells us “By her very nature the Church is in solidarity with the poor, the excluded, the marginalised and all those considered the outcasts of society. The poor are at the heart of the Church because our faith in Christ, who became poor, and was always close to the poor and the outcast, is the basis of our concern for the integral development of society’s most neglected members.”

Lord Jesus, give me the grace to recognise when you are gazing on me as you did on Matthew and to see you, especially in prayer at the Eucharist and in the faces of those I encounter. Amen.