The Calling—Repentance and Response
Dear Parish Family:
Today scripture readings underline the absolute necessity for us of repentance and a prompt response to God’s call. The first reading tells us how God had to punish the disobedient prophet Jonah to get him to preach repentance in Nineveh. The wicked people of Nineveh, however, accepted Jonah as God’s prophet, and they promptly responded to God’s call for repentance as Jonah preached it. In the second reading Paul urges the Christian community in Corinth to lose no time in accepting the message of the gospel and in renewing their lives with repentance because Jesus’ second coming might occur at any moment. And the Gospel describes how Jesus came to Galilee and began preaching, challenging people to “repent and believe in the gospel.” Just as John did, Jesus also called for repentance, meaning a change in one's mind or in the direction of one’s life, setting new priorities. Believing in the gospel demands a resolution to take Jesus’ words seriously, to translate them into action and to put trust in Jesus’ authority. Jesus preached the gospel, or good news, that God is a loving, forgiving, caring and merciful Father who wants to liberate us and save us from our sins through His son Jesus. By describing the call of Jesus' first disciples— Andrew, Peter, James and John— today’s Gospel also emphasizes how we, sinners, are to respond to God’s call with total commitment by abandoning our accustomed style of sinful life. Jesus selected his first disciples, right from their fishing boats. Jesus wanted these ordinary, hard-working people as assistants for his ministry because they were very responsive and generous instruments in the hands of God.
We need to appreciate our call to become Christ’s disciples: Every one of us is called by God, both individually, and collectively as a parish community, to continue Jesus’ mission of preaching the good news of God’s kingdom and healing the sick. We are called individually to a particular vocation in life like a priest, a missionary, a religious Sister, a religious Brother, a married man, a married woman, a single man or a single woman. Our own unique vocation should enable us to become what God wants us to be. As St. Francis Sales puts it, we are expected to bloom where we are planted. Our call, of course, begins with our baptism and the other sacraments of initiation. It is strengthened through the years with the Eucharist and reconciliation, healed and consoled by anointing and made manifest by matrimony or holy orders. The amazing truth is that God is relentless in calling us back to Himself even when we stray away from Him. Let us be thankful to God for His Divine grace of calling us to be members of the true Church. Let us remember that it is our vocation in life as Christians to borrow Christ’s light and to radiate it all around us in our society as unconditional love, mercy, forgiveness and humble service.
Aloha ke Akua
