The Nazareth Page - A gospel meditation for your home

September 22, 2024 – Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Mark 9:30-37

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Hardly anything is more important in the minds of many than the issue of social positioning. And while our country is officially based on the principle that all are created equal, it’s not difficult to wonder how we are all thought about as equal. Or to wonder if we are all treated by our country or our church as equal.

Recently the Catholic Church in the United States celebrated a Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis. I did not attend partly because my age and the state of my body warns me against travel and mixing in large crowds. But I did notice from pictures of the event that parades or processions were mostly organized according to one’s position or rank in the church. Bishops first, priests next, then seminarian and so forth. This was a reasonable arrangement, but after reading today’s gospel I wondered if there might not have been another ordering of participants. Perhaps putting children first.

l was educated not only as a theologian, but also as a sociologist. During all my professional life, I have been deeply concerned about social order and how we interact as individual persons in social settings. That perspective has caused me to be especially interested in what Pope Francis calls a synodal church where the views of all the members of the church should be considered important.

Today’s gospel has those rascal apostles arguing among themselves as to which of them was the greatest. Hearing their debate, Jesus offered his own view of it. In brief, he said that the one who serves all the rest is the best.

Then he invited a child to come forth and he embraced the child saying that one of the most important and telling ways of serving God was to recognize, value and help children. In those days historians tell us that children were definitely the least recognized in society. (Hopefully we have moved beyond that.)

In a sense Jesus was reversing the social order of his time. The least, the servants, were being positioned first. Servanthood (remember that servants made up a huge part of society back then) was being raised to equality with those who were free. Jesus thus advocated a radical of radical equality among all. All were to think of others as their equals. We’re still working on that and we can begin with our relationships within our families and with those we meet every day.      

David M. Thomas, PhD