23 January 2024 Mark 3:31-35
Jesus was a little snappish with his family here, dismissing them with a rather sharp, “My mother and siblings? Oh yeah? Well, tell them I am already talking to my real family.”
Ouch.
He may have said that because just a few verses earlier his family had said he was out of his mind. Family quarrels, even in the best families, can go on for a few days – or longer.
But there is more than that going on here.
Jesus meant what he said. We really are his brothers and sisters. It isn’t just pastors, deacons, priests, bishops and popes who get the seat next to Jesus. Everyone who is focused on doing the will of God has a relationship with him that close. No exaggeration. No kidding.
We have long been accustomed to thinking that the people who sit in the biggest chairs have the biggest jobs in the Church, and therefore the closest relationship to Christ. In the Church, however, the biggest job, the sanctification of the world, is entrusted to those who don’t have chairs at all, only pews, viz., the lay faithful: “The laity go forth as powerful proclaimers of a faith in things to be hoped for when they courageously join to their profession of faith a life springing from faith. This evangelization, that is, this announcing of Christ by a living testimony as well as by the spoken word, takes on a specific quality and a special force in that it is carried out in the ordinary surroundings of the world” (Lumen Gentium 35). Our job is bigger than the Pope’s.
Pastors, deacons, priests, bishops and popes don’t have anything like the immediate access to our families, neighborhoods and workplaces that the lay faithful do. Not only that, but as all clergy are daily and painfully aware, many regard clergy as “paid Christians.” Their faithfulness is a job requirement, not something that comes “from the heart.” This uncharitable judgment is almost entirely untrue, of course, but it remains an obstruction, keeping many clergy from the access to families, neighborhoods and workplaces they would like to have, that the lay faithful always have. That’s why evangelization is up to the lay faithful, up to us.
The lay faithful are brothers and sisters of Jesus, too, uniquely so, powerfully so. We have the biggest job in the church, bigger than any bishop, bigger than any pope. We are entrusted with the sanctification of the world.
That doesn’t mean, though, that we are ready for the job. This is the dirty little secret of the church. We are under-prepared, even unprepared, outrageously so, scandalously so.
“What does Jesus mean to you?” If most Catholics, most Christians were asked that question, they would freeze. They might point to the corporal works of mercy, how they feed the hungry, clothe the naked, house the homeless, and comfort the distressed – all very good things, necessary things. “Yes, but you don’t need to be a Christian to do all those things. Anybody can do them. Many non-Christians do. Federal and state governments do. What does Jesus mean to you? Why should I want Him? Why do I need Him? How do I know He is real?” Are we really ready for questions like that? Are the hundreds, thousands of teenagers we confirm every year ready for questions like that? Are they even at Mass the week after Confirmation? Are their parents?
“What does Jesus mean to you?” There are some questions that we never answer once and for all. Our answer to this one changes -- as we work, as we raise children, as we age, as we suffer, as we rejoice, as we grieve. If we are true brothers and sisters of Jesus, we keep on answering it. That’s a lot of answering. But if we are doing it right, our answers keep getting better.
That’s what you do if you have the biggest job in the Church.
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