Saint Matthew 9: 9-13: Vocation of the publican Matthew.
Today in the Gospel we see that the accusation of the Puritans to Jesus was really true: He goes with people with people of bad reputation. As he passed by, Jesus saw a man named Mateo, sitting at the tax counter, and said to him: «Follow me: he got up and followed him.» Matthew’s vocation is very significant. Jesus chooses a publican, that is, a tax collector in the service of Rome, the occupying power, and like all publicans, with a bad reputation among the people. Jesus gives him a vote of confidence, without asking him for public confessions of conversion. Matthew follows him with alacrity, leaving everything behind, and offers him a good meal at his house, to which he also invites other publicans, to the scandal of the «good guys. «It is the occasion for Jesus to express the purpose of his mission: «I did not come to call the just, but sinners».
Would we, if consulted, have called a tax collector as an apostle and witness to the gospel or as a member of our task force? Jesus, yes. He turned him «from publican to apostle,» as the prayer says. The sermon of Saint Bede that we read in the Office of Reading comments on it with delight. This is how Jesus was, understanding and tolerant. How are we? Perhaps uncompromising and puritanical, like the Pharisees who murmured about Jesus? «Go, learn what it means: I want mercy and not sacrifice.» Can we give a margin of confidence to those who have a bad reputation? Jesus gave it to Matthew and he fully responded. Thanks to him we have the gospel that bears his name, and generations and generations have known the Sermon on the Mount and the surprising news of the Beatitudes, and so many discourses and parables of Jesus.
Contemplating the example of Matthew, we can ask ourselves, first of all, if we follow Jesus with the same readiness as he: «Follow me …; he got up and followed him.» And if we are «evangelists», heralds of the Good News. Do we sow a little hope around us? St. Matthew set out to show that Jesus kept the promises of the Old Testament. Do we, like him, convey the conviction that in Jesus is God’s answer to all our questions?
Today Saint Matthew invited Jesus to eat. We do not invite him: we are invited by him to participate in the Eucharist, which is his Body and Blood, as food for our life. We are luckier than Mateo. Do we know how to take advantage of it? The prayer after communion will make us ask: «We have participated in the healthy joy that your apostle Saint Matthew experienced when having the Saviour himself as a guest in his home: grant us to continue to nourish ourselves always with the Body and Blood of Christ, not He has come to save the righteous, but sinners». That moment of encounter with Jesus will give us the light and strength we need for our evangelizing mission throughout the journey.
Peace and good
Fr. Antonio Majeesh George Kallely, OFM
