This Sunday, January 25th, is the Sunday of the Word of God, a tradition instituted by Pope Francis just a few years ago.
But don’t all liturgical celebrations have a significant portion dedicated to listening to the Word of God? Why dedicate a Sunday a year to this particular celebration?
In many churches, the second reading is omitted every Sunday because it is impossible to assimilate so much word, and even less so if it is read all at once without pauses between one reading and another. What’s the point of reading so much if we don’t have time to pray with it?
“The word of God is living and active,” says the letter to the Hebrews 4:12. But it is so when we allow it to penetrate to the deepest parts of the heart so that it helps us to discern in our following of Christ.
Today’s gospel message shows Jesus discerning the way in which he will carry out his mission. Now that John is no longer among them, Jesus chooses his own style of liberation of the people. He sits in Capernaum, the Jewish capital of Galilee, very close to the “pagan” territories of Zebulon and Naphtali. Although he takes up John’s message of the announcement of the Kingdom of God, he does not do so associated with baptism, or any religious rite, and he does not announce a judgment against those who do not accept it.
The evangelist Matthew quotes the prophet Isaiah to help us understand that this great light shining on the people is Jesus. More than a prophecy, it is an interpretation in light of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection.
Jesus does not place himself in the desert, but rather where the people live, and instead of solitude, from which he has already experienced before beginning his announcement, he begins by calling people with whom to journey.
This Word is living and powerful, and if I listen to it, letting it speak to my heart, shaking me from my lethargy. The Word is not an ethical code, it is not a message from God. The Word is God among us in the person of Jesus. We are not called to imitate him as he did not imitate John. Rather, he listened, felt, and followed his inner voice that called him to embody the kingdom with others through the word and through deeds.
I deeply grieve that our church has not known how to bring people closer to the Word, helped to interpret it, to pray it, to live it in our lives. In that sense, our Protestant brothers and sisters are a thousand times better with the formation they receive, and with the importance they give to the Word to reach a mature and committed Christianity.
We cannot dissociate the celebration of the Eucharist from the study and deepening of the Word. Catholics continue to give more importance to the presence of Christ in the consecrated bread and wine than in the Word and in the Christian community.
A good example of this are the words of Jesus in this Gospel of Matthew (to Peter and Andrew, to James and John) and which remain valid: “Come with me.” I call you and continue to call you to walk with me, to discern your path, to express together what it means to be a Christian community.
I call you at this moment, in the 21st century, to proclaim the utopia of the kingdom everywhere, traveling paths, teaching, proclaiming and healing every ailment and sickness of the people.
You are the light that sees the people who live in darkness, that light that shines on those who live in darkness and shadow of death. You have been granted to be the Word today because “to those who receive him, he gives power to become children of God: to those who believe in his name.” (John 1:12)
Let us celebrate this Sunday of the Word of God, but let us not fail to reserve a time each day after a moment of silence, a space to listen to the Word so that it may become life of our life.
Carmen Notario
English version translated with AI