Why not take a bit of time to reflect on Sunday’s gospel with your class?

Third Sunday – Sunday 27th January 2019

Growing up in Blantyre, our next door neighbours were a family of five adult siblings who chose to spend their old age together. They were significantly older than my parents and in the natural way of life one by one they each died, though they did not leave the world in the order they entered it. When the last of them, Jane, a retired nursing officer, died their home was taken over by a nephew and his family. Like all young couples they pulled the house apart filling skip after skip.   My mother who had cared for Jane in them last years of her life went into near shock when she saw the crucifix that had hung on their hall way wall for decades at the top of the skip. She rescued it from the skip and it found a home on our wall.

Those memories were very vivid to me on my own mother’s death when I had to clear her home. I was respectful of items that were important to her. Among her prized possessions was a large picture of the Sacred Heart which now hangs in the church house. That was a very important image of God for her and in difficult times or exam days I can still hear her say, “Place your trust in the Sacred Heart.”

In St Luke’s gospel we are presented with the evangelist’s image of god. For Luke, Christ is not primarily a miracle worker or a shepherd. Firstly he is a prophet, a proclaimer of news, a bringer of a message and a bold and radical preacher.

The faith of many in Israel was not strong, no more than embers indeed but Christ, through his words, was able to reignite those embers and fill the hearts of the people with fire.

Today, our faith too is not as strong throughout the Catholic community as it once was; for some it may be no more than embers. Christ’s bold words can put fire into our hearts again. For that to happen, His mission statement needs to touch our hearts,

Good news to the poor, liberty for captives, and know we often are imprisoned in jails of our own making which have no bars. Only when we are fired up with faith are we able to help reignite the embers of others.