Message of Abbot Paul - Tuesday 25th April 2023

Today we keep the feast of St Mark the Evangelist. We don’t really know whether this is the Mark or John Mark mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles as the companion of Paul and Barnabas to Cyprus. Tradition tells us that he took the Gospel to Egypt and founded the Church of Alexandria. His body is venerated at St Mark’s Basilica in Venice. I wonder if the countless tourists to that unique city ever spare a thought or a prayer for the saint who made the city great. St Luke’s body, on the other hand, is venerated not far from Venice, at the Benedictine Abbey of Santa Giustina in Padua, another wonderful city.

 

​The Gospel chosen for today’s feast is made up of the final verses of Mark, (Mk 16: 15-20), the last words of the risen Christ to his disciples, followed by a brief account of the Ascension. “Jesus showed himself to the Eleven and said to them:

  ‘Go out to the whole world; proclaim the Good News to all creation. He who believes and is baptised will be saved; he who does not believe will be condemned. These are the signs that will be associated with believers: in my name they will cast out devils; they will have the gift of tongues; they will pick up snakes in their hands, and be unharmed should they drink deadly poison; they will lay their hands on the sick, who will recover.’

  And so the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven: there at the right hand of God he took his place, while they, going out, preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word by the signs that accompanied it.”

 

​Jesus sends the Apostles out to the whole world, not simply to all peoples, but to the whole of creation, to proclaim the Good News, that Jesus, who was dead, is risen from the dead and offers to all who believe in him and are baptised the gift of salvation and the forgiveness of their sins. Why would anyone want to refuse this gift, yet many are not interested? Sadly, Christ means nothing to them, even to many who are baptised and once believed. Let’s keep all the lapsed in our prayers and never cease to love them and plead with God for them. The signs associated with believers are not an invitation to try out any of those things. We sometimes hear of people who do, but they don’t live to regret It. Healing the sick is one thing, drinking poison and picking up snakes is another. Even so, one night in Peru, (we had no electricity after 9pm), I stepped on something, cold and slimy, slipped and fell. In the morning, we found an extremely poisonous snake dead on the cloister floor. In the dark, I had stepped barefoot on its head.