Message of Abbot Paul - Monday 31st January
St John Bosco
Message from Fr Paul for Monday, 31st January 2022
Many of you who read this daily message have been asking for an update on Toby’s health and progress. He appears to be doing well. He enjoys his short walks, he loves his food, he rests and sleeps a good deal and he seems very contented with his lot. It’s hard to say whether he misses his friends, playing with footballs and tennis balls and going on outings, especially to the beach. However, today is D Day, you could say, in that he returns to the veterinary clinic for X-rays of the leg that was operated on. His surgeons need to see how the plates are doing and whether they are exactly where and how they should be. It’s a nervous moment for us both, so I ask your prayers again.
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Today the Church remembers St John Bosco, the 19th century Italian priest, educator and writer, who dedicated his life to the education of children and founded the Salesian Congregation to that end. He was born into extreme poverty, so he dedicated his life to the Christian education of the poorer sections of society, especially among children who had been abandoned or left orphans. He worked as a shepherd in his childhood and what rudimentary education he received was from his parish priest. He is greatly loved and admired all over the world by Catholics and non-Catholics alike.
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Today’s Gospel passage is rather long, (Mk 5: 1-20), and in it, Mark relates the famous episode when Jesus heals a man who is possessed by an unclean spirit. The man, often called the Gerasene demoniac, is in a sorry state indeed when Jesus meets him. We are told that Jesus arrives by boat with his disciples, but they disappear altogether from the story. Centre stage is taken by this man, forced by the townsfolk, who have rejected him, to live chained among the tombs out of town. The spirit in the man recognises Jesus to be “son of the Most High God,” and pleads with Jesus not to cast him out or send him away. However, he is not alone for there are many of them, a legion of spirits. They ask to go into the pigs grazing on the mountainside, which is what Jesus does. Two thousand pigs rush headlong over the cliff and fall into the sea. Pigs, of course, can’t swim, so they drown. The swineherds rush into the town to tell the people what has happened. Their reaction beggars belief. Rather than be angry and upset about the loss of their pigs and the pollution of the lake, they are annoyed, horrified in fact, to see that the former demoniac is at peace, properly dressed and in his full senses. They are afraid of him now because he has been healed. They implore Jesus to leave and, although the man who has been possessed asks to go with him, Jesus sends him on a mission to tell his own people what he has experienced at the hands of Jesus. He becomes a missionary, for all who hear his story throughout the Decapolis are amazed.
Somehow, this is an improbable miracle and reads more like a parable, a parable about the kingdom, in which the townspeople hinder the work of Jesus, while the demoniac appears as that good soil where the seed of the kingdom can be sown, germinate, take root and thrive. Hence it is linked with the Parable of the Sower and the Seed. The townsfolk are the bad soil, where the seed cannot germinate and grow. The demoniac shows that, rather like the mustard seed, the kingdom takes root in the most unlikely places, where you would not expect good soil. Think of the tax collectors and prostitutes. Let us pray today that the Lord help us not to judge others or think ourselves superior. Others might have better soil for the seed of the kingdom than we do. That’s a sobering thought!
