Pope: Call of first Christians inspires us to share
Gospel
(Vatican Radio) At the Angelus on Sunday, Pope Francis
focused on the early days of Jesus ministry, in Galilee. This region, the Holy
Father noted, was a kind of crossroads between the Mediterranean and the
Mesopotamian hinterlands. Because of the presence of large numbers of pagans,
for the Jews Galilee was seen as a geographical periphery. Little was expected
from Galilee in terms of the story of salvation – but it was precisely here
that the light of the Gospel began to be diffused throughout the world, not
only to the Jews, but also to the Gentiles.
Here, following St John the Baptist, Jesus preached the
coming of the Kingdom of Heaven. But unlike the Baptist, who waited for the
people to come to him, Jesus chose the life of a wandering prophet, going out
to meet the people.
Pope Francis noted that Jesus didn’t simply proclaim the
Gospel, He sought out companions to associate with Himself in His mission of
salvation. He chose simple fisherman, Peter and Andrew, James and John, calling
them not in an extraordinary manner, but in the routine of their daily lives.
The fishermen, called to be “fishers of men”, responded immediately to Jesus
call.
“We, Christians of today,” the Pope said, “have the joy of
proclaiming and bearing witness to our faith because of that first announcement,
because there were those humble and courageous men who responded generously to
the call of Jesus.”
Our awareness of the beginnings of the Christian mission, he
continued, “raises up in us the desire to bring the word, the love, and the
tenderness of Jesus into every context, even the most impervious and resistant.
All the spaces of human life are ground in which to sow the seed of the Gospel,
that it might bear the fruits of salvation.”
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