Commentary on the Gospel – December 13, 2025

There are people who run from place to place looking for the extraordinary and the miraculous. They travel from one apparition site to another. It is as if they felt the need to find a window into heaven, into the other world, that would confirm their faith. Because what we already have seems not to be enough. I have the impression that these people—certainly with all the good will in the world—have not really understood what the Gospel is, what Jesus’ message is, or even the true meaning of the Incarnation.

The truth is that in Jesus, God has already shown us where He wants to be, where He wants to appear in our world. And it has not been in apparitions, lights, or miraculous events. God became present in our world by walking our roads, by staying close to the poor and the sinners, by becoming “impure” with the impure, by frequenting places of sin where “respectable people” refused to go. Jesus was not a man of the temple. Yes, He prayed, but nature was His sanctuary. And He had no problem interrupting His prayer to attend to those who looked for Him—almost certainly thinking more about the help they might receive than about being adored as the Son of God.

But it was not only Jesus. We have twenty centuries of history filled with living witnesses who did not perform miracles or appear surrounded by light, but who, in the name of Jesus, stayed close to those who suffer in any way—making the love of God present with open hands and hearts attentive to the needs and pains of the brothers and sisters they met along the way.

In them, Elijah has already come, and Jesus has come, and all those who were meant to come—and those who will keep coming. The problem is that instead of looking at these witnesses—perhaps because they are not impressive or spectacular—we prefer to look for the miracle, the light, the apparition. And in doing so, we miss God Himself, who wants to meet us right where He always chooses to be found: in the poor and in those who suffer.