Fr. Roger J. Landry
Conversations with Consequences Podcast
Homily for the Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, B, Vigil
January 20, 2024
To listen to an audio recording of this short Sunday homily, please click below:
https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/catholicpreaching/1.20.24_Landry_ConCon_1.mp3
The following text guided the homily:
* This is Fr. Roger Landry and it’s a joy to have a chance to ponder with you the consequential conversation Jesus wants to have with us this Sunday, when we will enter into the dramatic scene of what he said and did at the beginning of his public ministry. He preached his first homily — just 18 words in English, 16 words in St. Mark’s Greek original — and then entered into a short, but life-altering conversation on the shore of the Sea of Galilee with two sets of brothers who would become key collaborators in how he would change the world. In these words and interactions, Jesus sets forth for believers in every age the various consequences he hopes for in his personal interaction with us.
* Let’s enter the scene, beginning with Jesus’ homily — what he, as God, had been waiting since the Fall to announce. In his first public words, Jesus, the Word-made-flesh declared, “The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand: repent and believe in the Gospel!”
* Jesus first announces two essential facts: The first is, “The time is fulfilled.” Jesus says that the time of waiting is over. The fullness of time has come. Therefore, now, not later, is the time to act. Now, as St. Paul would later say, is the day of salvation. The second fact is, “The kingdom of God is at hand.” Jesus declares that the long-awaited kingdom of God has arrived. God’s presence is erupting, and the time to enter his kingdom, to share in his reign, is today. Much like he would do in his hometown synagogue of Nazareth after reading the messianic prophecy of Isaiah when he proclaimed. “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing,” so in his first homily at the Galilean Sea, Jesus could say his words about the fulfillment of time and the coming of God’s kingdom were coming to fruition in him.
* After these two table-setting facts, Jesus turns to four ways we’re supposed to respond to this awesome reality. These are the four conditions for entering and living in his kingdom. These are the four action verbs we need to do in order not to waste the time God has given us but make the most of it. The first action is “Repent.” The second is “Believe.” The third is “Follow.” And the fourth is “Fish.” Now’s the time, he was saying, to do all four. Let’s examine each of these realities in turn and ask ourselves whether we’ve been heeding Jesus message.
* The first verb is “repent.” In Greek, this word ismetanoete, which etymologically means a total revolution of our mind, of the way we look at things. It’s a call to conversion, to think no longer as everyone else thinks, to do no longer as everyone else does, but to put on the mind of God, to align our head, heart and actions to his. It is a summons to compare ourselves to God rather than to everyone else and to recognize we’re not yet living enough as the image and likeness of God. For some people this call will mean a 180-degree turn. For others it might mean a 50-degree turn or a 10-degree turn. But all of us need this conversion and we will always need it. The Christian life is one of continual conversion, in which we literally learn how fully to “con-vert” or “turn with” Jesus in all parts of our life. As Jesus turns in prayer to the Father, we turn with him; as he turns with charity to our neighbor, we turn with him; as he turns with mercy to a family member who has sinned against him and against us, we, too,
