Message of Abbot Paul - Saturday 14th January 2023

I am not sure how and when this message will get to you as our Internet system has gone down again, although it might miraculously return by the time I finish! St Benedict proposes “prayer with tears” during Lent. I find they always work. What a day this has been. About midday, I set out for my osteopath at Letton, little imagining that I would never get there. I thought I’d take my usual route via Madley and Bridge Sollars. And I did, ignoring the various Road Closed signs, as the sun was shining and a number of cars were coming in the opposite direction and I had another on my tail. I made it, but not without fear and trepidation, but I knew that if I drove slowly, we could “walk on water.” I had a lot of experience of this in Peru. Then on the A road, just 4 miles before my destination, there was a diversion that took me close to Weobley and by a roundabout route, I was on my way to Letton again. You can imagine my disappointment, when just a mile and half before my destination, the road was closed, this time with barriers to prevent people driving through. There was nothing for it but to turn around and return to Belmont. The whole journey took two and a half hours. Much of the countryside was under water and the Wye had burst its banks in several places. Let’s spare a prayer for all those whose lives are severely affected by flooding in many parts of the country.

 

​Our Gospel passage from Mark today, (Mk 2: 13-17), sees Jesus taking a walk along the lakeshore and calling Levi, the tax-collector, usually called Matthew. The call is radical, as is the response. “Jesus went out to the shore of the lake; and all the people came to him, and he taught them. As he was walking on, he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus, sitting by the customs house, and he said to him, ‘Follow me.’ And he got up and followed him.” Jesus is then invited to a meal at Levi’s House, which leads to an argument between Jesus and the scribes of the Pharisee party. “When Jesus was at dinner in his house, a number of tax collectors and sinners were also sitting at the table with Jesus and his disciples; for there were many of them among his followers. When the scribes of the Pharisee party saw him eating with sinners and tax collectors, they said to his disciples, ‘Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ When Jesus heard this, he said to them, ‘It is not the healthy who need the doctor, but the sick. I did not come to call the virtuous, but sinners.’” We know the story well and have read it in the different versions in which it has come down to us. The fact that Jesus mixes with men and women regarded as sinners by the religious authorities and even eats with them and relaxes in their company becomes a reason to criticise him and ultimately seek his arrest. The reply of Jesus is constant and it’s deeply consoling and enriching for us even today. “It is not the healthy who need the doctor, but the sick. I did not come to call the virtuous, but sinners.” We are the sinners whom Jesus came to call. Thanks be to God!