Absolutely focused on his Father's will, Jesus leaves behind the love and security of family, as well as a good-paying job as a carpenter. He launches out on his own with a ragtag collection of friends to preach and wander the countryside. Small wonder that when he comes home for a short visit, his relatives fear he has gone out of his mind.
And one day as he begins to preach in his own neighborhood, someone whispers to him, "Your mother and your brothers and your sisters are outside asking for you." It is then that, most amazingly, Jesus gazes at those around him, those who follow him and listen to him and take his words to heart, and he names these people his mother and brothers.
Following Jesus and seeking to give ourselves unreservedly to him and his way, we have become his blood relatives, even members of his own body. Jesus has inaugurated the kingdom of God, a place where we are to live always, as if God were in charge, a place of new interrelationship and mutual compassion.
Recent photograph by Brother Brian. Meditation inspired by Father Peter's Sunday homily.
