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Commentary of the Word
The Scandal of the Incarnation
Today, the Gospel presents Jesus in the synagogue of his hometown, Nazareth, where he is rejected by the people who know him well. The people of Nazareth viewed his popularity and acceptance in the nearby villages with suspicion and jealousy. Because they were unwilling to embrace his new teaching, they missed out on the opportunity to receive healing through his compassion.
We run the same risk when we take the gospel for granted. Pope Francis beautifully reflects on the attitude of the villagers of Nazareth: Jesus’s fellow villagers knew him for thirty years, and they thought they knew everything! They remained at the exterior level and refused to know what was new about Jesus.
When we permit the comfort of routine and preconceived notions to prevail, it becomes challenging to embrace new experiences. If we are not open to the unexpected revelations from God, our faith can become a monotonous cycle that slowly loses its meaning and becomes a dull, everyday habit.
Why didn’t Jesus’s fellow villagers recognize and believe in Him? They couldn’t accept that the vastness of God would be manifested in the insignificance of our human bodies, or that the Son of God would be the son of a carpenter, or that the divine would be concealed within the human form, or that God would dwell in the face, words, and actions of an ordinary man. This is the scandal: the incarnation of God, His tangibility, His ‘everyday life’.
Pope Francis quoted St. Augustine, who said, “I am afraid of God, the Lord when he passes by… I am afraid of not recognizing the Lord when he passes by.” Let us not miss the opportunity to recognize the Lord in the ordinariness of our lives.