Reflection for 3rd Sunday of the Year (A)
Scattering the darkness…
Darkness and light are almost universal symbols of our human condition. In time and turn they depict difficulties and dangers, the reality of death and recourse to despair, the longing for life and looking for hope. At this time of the year, in our part of the world, we look to light for the gain of growth and lengthening of days. In today’s Gospel there is a reprise and rearrangement of the lines of Isaiah – ‘The people that lived in darkness has seen a great light’ – to introduce Jesus and his incarnation of the Kingdom of God. Jesus’ mission is to make known and present the power of God in his own person, in his proclamation and practise. Matthew summarises this in terms of both communication and cure. Jesus invites others to become involved in this work of God. The call of the sets of brothers is the foundation of the community of faith that we call church. This is a call to both follow Jesus and to bear fruit, to help in the harvest of history, to give our hands to gather in the nets. As well as working together, there is the need for common witness. As the week of prayer for Christian unity has just ended, it is good to be reminded – in the second reading – ‘to be united again in your belief and practise’. There is a haunting phrase from a Soviet dissident in the 1970s – to roll back the darkness. The darkness of our world has many dimensions – injustice, illness, ignorance, infidelity, injury. May the light of God’s Kingdom scatter the darkness of our world and may our witness, words and works play a part in that mission. – kevin O’Gorman SMA
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