Fourth Thursday in Ordinary Time
Thursday, February 6, 2025
Fourth Week of the Year
Saint Paul Miki and Companions, Martyrs
Mark 6:7-13, Hebrews 12:18-24; Psalm 48:2-11 (Lectionary 326)
When Jesus sends the Twelve out on mission he gives them a short course on how to be effective in proclaiming and establishing the “reign of God.” This is important for us, because, as Pope Paul VI wrote: “The Church exists in order to evangelize.” And John Paul II, along with John XXIII and Benedict XVI, has summoned the whole Church to take part in a “new evangelization” (See Evangelization in the Modern World, nos. 14, 21, 41; At the Beginning of the New Millenium, nos. 40-46).
To “evangelize” it is not enough to proclaim the Good News with words. When Jesus sent his apostles out to do it, he hardly mentioned what they were to preach. But he gave minute details on how they were to live.
This is the key to evangelization. Again, it is Paul VI who says it:
The first means of evangelization is the witness of an authentically Christian life. …. It is therefore primarily by her conduct and by her life that the Church will evangelize the world.
So Jesus sent his apostles out “two by two,” to make it clear that the first concern of evangelizers must be to live and work as a community united in mind and will and heart. John Paul II wrote:
We need to promote a spirituality of communion, making it the guiding principle wherever Christians are formed…. [and] encourage a fruitful dialogue between pastors and faithful… uniting them a priori in all that is essential, and leading them to pondered agreement in matters open to discussion.
Jesus gave the apostles “authority over unclean spirits,” but instructed them to live lives of visible powerlessness, stripped of human resources, to show that they relied entirely on God for their support and the fruitfulness of their ministry. They were to “take nothing for their journey… no bread, no bag, no money in their belts….”
We have already seen that Jesus did not exclude the weak and sinful. “Good standing” was to be based more on faith and sincere desire than on performance. But when it came to preaching the radical principles and pure ideals of the Good News, they were not to make any compromises just to win support or acceptance. “If any will not welcome you… shake their dust off your feet!”
So the apostles went out and used power against demons but “anointed with oil those who were sick.
Initiative: Study Christian witness. What does your lifestyle say to others?
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