«COME BEHIND ME, I WILL MAKE YOU BECOME FISHERS OF MEN". AND IMMEDIATELY THEY LEFT THE NETWORKS AND FOLLOWED HIM

How might we describe the kingdom of God proclaimed by Jesus? The main difficulty is that Jesus never used any definition to talk about it. Rather, he used parables and images, paragonaldo, to always remain with the Gospel of Mark that we will read this year, to a sower who throws seed on the ground or to a mustard seed and so on.

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Left behind is the passage in the Gospel according to John last Sunday, the lectionary takes us back to Mark, who, the exposition of the trilogy common to the synoptics has been completed (John the Baptist, Baptism of Jesus and trial in the desert), resumes the narrative giving us an important temporal indication that we learn from the beginning of today's Gospel.

«After Giovanni was arrested, Jesus went to Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God, and he said: «The time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is near; convert and believe in the Gospel". Passing along the Sea of ​​Galilee, he saw Simone and Andrea, brother of Simone, as they cast their nets into the sea; they were in fact fishermen. Jesus said to them,: «Come after me, I will make you fishers of men ". And immediately they left their nets and followed him. Going a little further, vide Giacomo, son of Zebedee, and John his brother, while they too repaired the nets in the boat. And he immediately called them. And they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the boys and went after him. (MC 1,14-20).

Marco writes that Jesus begins to proclaim the kingdom of God "after John was arrested" (MC 1,14 cf.. also Mt 4,12). Many imagine that the chronology of the beginning of Jesus' public ministry unfolded like this: from Galilee, region he comes from, Jesus goes down to the Jordan to be baptized. Immediately afterwards, attempted, he remains for forty days in the desert before returning to Galilee. But instead more time must have passed and the turning point, what makes Jesus return to Galilee is represented by the arrest of the Baptist. Perhaps it is at that precise moment that Jesus becomes aware that it is time to assume his responsibilities.

The voice that cried in the desert, for it has been silenced, now move on to the Word that announces the kingdom. This interpretation helps us believers in times of difficulty and suffering, what John's arrest must have been like for Jesus and he makes us say it: something must be done. It is in such situations that, if you don't go, no one can go in your place. The call that Jesus will now make of his disciples, he experienced it firsthand; he saw the kingdom he announces arrive first, even in the painful news that Giovanni can no longer speak.

But here we are at an important theological question. How might we describe the kingdom of God proclaimed by Jesus? The main difficulty is that Jesus never used any definition to talk about it. Rather, he used parables and images, paragonaldo, to always remain with the Gospel of Mark that we will read this year, to a sower who throws seed on the ground (MC 4,26) or a mustard seed (MC 4,31) and so on. The kingdom, says Jesus, not only is it close, but we must welcome him as children do (MC 10,15) and get inside, although it's not that easy, especially if you have a lot of wealth (MC 10,23). It is present, that is, here or near, but it is also the future, like the one in which Jesus will drink, together with us, the new wine, other wine than that of his last dinner (MC 14,25). Christian theology has developed a formula for this purpose, that of "already" but "not yet", almost an oxymoron which says however that we can already inherit the kingdom and live in it, even if it is not yet accomplished. It is not yet extended to all men, ma, as the document of the Second Vatican Council teaches The light "he is already present in mystery" with the Church (cf.. n. 5).

In this sense Jesus distinguishes himself from the two main conceptions of the kingdom that circulated in the Judaism of his time. In fact, he did not invent this idea, already known to the Old Testament (cf. 1Cr 28,5) and did not apply it to that way of thinking that saw the kingdom as a "nationalistic" reality, all present, to be implemented perhaps at any cost, nor even to the opposite conception, apocalyptic type, who saw the kingdom as possible only as a future realization that denied the present. If we want to trace these two extremes in the history of humanity, we could say that materialism has often been based on the illusion that everything could be resolved here, now; but on the other hand it is easy to recognize in certain spiritualistic movements the devaluation of the present, viewed negatively.

Jesus instead used the idea of ​​kingdom to say first of all that it has arrived and therefore we can enter. But to do this we need to change our mentality, way of reasoning and thinking; to say it in the words of Jesus: «convert» (MC 1,15). "Come your kingdom!», pray to the Church again, today, after two thousand years. The kingdom already exists, but it must still be welcomed as a gift and found there even where it is difficult to see it.

Therefore in conformity with the Jewish eschatological expectation, but with the decisive difference that it is no longer a matter of waiting, the Kingdom of God is the effect of the messianic event announced by Jesus and present in him. The full unfolding of his redemptive sovereignty has not yet been realized, but the time of the end has come and therefore to speak appropriately there is no longer historical development, but rather a recapitulation of the whole story called to trial.

«This is the content of the “gospel of God” which is briefly reported to us by the most ancient tradition collected by Mark: «The time is fulfilled and the Kingdom of God is near: convert, and believe in the gospel" (1,14-15). What is announced here is the time (the kairos) of definitive fulfillment, the promised coming of the Kingdom, the great turning point of the world inaugurated by Jesus whose final act is about to take place with his parousia. Evidently it cannot be the historical Jesus speaking here, but rather the Risen One preached by the evangelist, which precisely marks the time of the end between resurrection and parousia, as a unique event where all the time, the whole story condenses, including the life of Jesus itself. For this now, unlike Jewish eschatology, "faith in the gospel" is needed, that is, in Jesus Christ, in the Messiah, who is present as the one who came and who is coming. Therefore, by virtue of this faith, everything precipitates and concentrates in the present, there is no longer oscillation between past and future, tradition and expectation; but only the current hour in which the past is redeemed and the future is only the desire for fulfillment: «Come Lord Jesus» (AP 22, 20).[1]

The Gospel continues describing Jesus' haste to bring his word about the kingdom to fruition, because “the time is fulfilled”. The concept emerges very clearly in the Gospel of Mark, where the adverb abounds euthus (straight), "right away", repeated dozens of times. This concern finds its first application in the call of the four disciples (vv. 16-20) and in the episode of the teaching in the synagogue of Capernaum, accompanied by the liberation of a demoniac (next Sunday). Jesus, with gestures and words, it really shows how the kingdom came to be, and he says it: to the disciples (just called to him) and its people (in the synagogue). So the kingdom can only be a space in which God is present, where is that, precisely, only he reigns. The other powers can do nothing but recognize his authority («I know who you are: the saint of God" of MC 1,24) and submit.

The Fathers of the Church they were impressed by the way Jesus called the first to follow him: they note that they were simple and illiterate people (Origene), who will probably have objected with their inadequacy (Eusebio); we are also surprised by the fact that these "immediately" leave the networks and follow him (cf.. MC 1,18), but above all for the fact that even today, after many years, Jesus still "steps by" (MC 1,16) to our situations, to our daily life, to our networks, and invites us to follow him to be with him.

Each of us he is called where he is and every beginning always has a before that prepared it on which something new is then grafted, a change: just as the seed that has been sown has a different shape from the plant that will then sprout, so we too are taken by the Lord starting from our stories and our today to develop those potential for good and life that are contained in the "little seed" of our life and that only the Lord can open up and transform with the strength and imagination of his Spirit. We are asked to pay attention to his calling voice, filial and trusting abandonment to his words, and the readiness to respond without delays in time or attachments to the "already", to that known and known that reassures us but also risks blocking us: «And immediately they left their nets and followed him».

 

From the Hermitage, 21 January 2024

 

NOTE

[1] Gaeta G., The time of the end, Any, 2020

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