Homily

This Sunday the Gospel is addressed to the first disciples. Today, Jesus continues to meet people and to call them so that they follow him, as did the first disciples. Gospel means good news. How much bad news we hear, creating at times anguish and fear in us! The Gospel is the most beautiful news that we can receive: God ¬¬- love, the mystery of life, the meaning of existence - speaks; he addresses you, he wants you to follow him, he takes pleasure in your being with him, and he needs you. Jesus seeks his friends. Our whole life is meaningful because it is in relation to someone. Life is about meeting. We must thus be attentive, sensitive, and good! The encounter with Jesus, which is repeated today, is called the Gospel. We often are busy trying to discover who we are and what it is it that we are really looking for. We cannot discover this alone or in the mirror, but only by listening to him and following him.
Jesus gives no orders, like a general: yet he speaks as one having authority. He does not expound a lesson, like a professor: yet he is the only teacher. He does not listen distractedly or without saying anything: he is a true friend. He does not like to talk only about himself, like an egocentric person. He does not judge everything and everyone, like we do, thinking we are more intelligent than others or trying to show we are: he explains our sin to us. The Gospel is not a moral code, even though it shows us what really counts and helps us to compare ourselves with love. It is not a book that once read is put away; rather the more we open it the more we understand it. It is Gospel: I love you, I want you to be with me; I want your life to be beautiful, I want you to be happy; there is no happiness without loving others and without helping those in need; follow me, because otherwise you are following the ruler of this world and you end up being a prisoner of yourself.
"Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God." Thus begins the Gospel passage this third Sunday of ordinary time, taken from Mark 1:14-20. We are at the beginning of Jesus’ preaching and thus of the very first Christian community. It is not a matter of a beginning way back in time, but of the living and enduring foundation of the Church. Jesus did not preach once and for all; his preaching continues from generation to generation, and that is the reason faith is alive today too. The term "Gospel" that Mark uses, the Gospel which Jesus invites us to believe, has a specific meaning in this passage; it means the good news which is announced when everything seems to be silent. It is not by accident that the evangelist says that Jesus began to move and speak after he heard of John the Baptist’s arrest. The word of justice, severe and demanding, that came out of the mouth of this prophet in the desert had been chained by Herod’s power. The land of Palestine had plunged, as if in a desert, without any words of truth; everyone was intimidated by the ambiguous power of the current Herod. This is why Jesus feels even more urgently the need to make a word of hope for the coming of a new world resound again in the ears and, above all, in the heart of people. He left behind the region of the Jordan and headed for Galilee, the most peripheral and notorious region of Palestine. And he began to spread through the streets and squares of this land the gospel message, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news."
To those poor men and women of Galilee, Jesus announces that the time of domination by the violent and of usurpation by the arrogant and ruthlessly ambitious is over; the time when people are abandoned and abandon themselves, don’t love and aren’t loved, is finished. In short, the time of slavery is over. And the time of the freedom of the Kingdom of God has arrived: a kingdom of peace, solidarity, friendship, forgiveness, renewal of hearts and of life. This Gospel is announced today to us, and for us too it is an opportune occasion. Not just because our days are not so different from those of John the Baptist, but also because it is urgent to make the decision to renew our own life and that of society. There occurs from time to time an opportune moment which should be seized; a moment in which the words "be reborn" become more concrete. It is a moment of decision.
Even political conditions can push us to a decision-making moment; even though the scope of the decision is much broader, and touches the very roots of our faith. It is a situation analogous to that described in today’s Gospel by Simon and Andrew, his brother, engaged in their everyday work. Jesus found them while they were putting their nets in order and called them, "Follow me and I will make you fish for people." The same thing occurs a bit later for two other brothers, James and John; they too were busy with their fishing. All four left their fishing nets in order to take up those for fishing people. They must no longer fish for themselves. The call shifted their attention, their preoccupation, their very life. Now they must fish for others, to build up a Kingdom encompassing a common destiny for all people. The first disciples were born out of that decision; and no one can find another way but this one indicated by Mark.
Why follow him? Jesus does not convince us with a program! He only says, "Follow me and I will make you fish for people." Don’t fish for yourself, but for others; don’t lose your heart and the only life you have seeking things, but help me with love to find others. Help me to draw many people out of the confused sea of the world, of loneliness that so often breeds fear. Help me to reach them with the nets of friendship, so that they are loved. The Gospel does not make us sacrifice anything in our life. On the contrary, it helps us lose that which is of no use: pride, short-sighted love for oneself, in order to give us a hundredfold in brothers, sisters, mothers, and fathers.
They immediately left their nets. They were in a hurry. Time has grown short. We are not eternal! Love wants to arrive quickly, it misses no opportunity. Those men had certainly not understood everything! Neither have we! They only chose to take the word of friendship seriously. The fathers of the Church used to say, "Understand that you are a small universe. Do you want to hear another voice, so that you not think of yourself as small and vile?" That voice is the Gospel of Jesus, who enters the universe of our heart in order to open it with a soft persistence that continues even until the end. Even when we see only darkness ahead of us, he continues to propose, "Follow me."