By Fr Edmund Power, OSB

Rejoice in the Lord always! The words of the entrance antiphon of today’s Mass, taken from the letter of St Paul to the Philippians, have given this Sunday its popular name of Gaudete! Not an easy imperative to obey, we might grumble as we witness so many problems in our world, but Paul was in prison when he wrote this letter and his words of encouragement arise from a deep sense that for me to live is Christ (Phil 1:21). This is the season in which we express our trust in the coming of the Lord into our lives. He came in the past and He’ll come at the end of time. Meanwhile, He comes in the grace of the present moment in so many ways.

Today’s gospel shows us the imprisoned John the Baptist, seeking confirmation as to the identity of Jesus. The Lord offers him six signs, four of which have already been promised in the prophecy of Isaiah. How might we read these signs? The blind receive their sight: reading our lives and our history through the eyes of faith in Jesus we see below the surface of things to the providential reality that underlies all that exists. The lame walk: no longer blocked and stumbling, we resume our joyful journey, and come to Zion with singing, through fields of flowers, as the first reading proclaims, to the heavenly Jerusalem, our eternal destiny. Lepers are cleansed: all that renders us “unclean”, all that makes us doubt our value or fall into exclusion and despair, is transformed and we return to the solidarity of the saved. The deaf hear: a word that has sounded distantly or indistinctly finds a new clarity and we perceive the music of God’s presence wherever it plays. The dead are raised up: Paul who says I die every day (1 Cor 15:31) in a constant death to egoism, completes the paschal faith with the words, Awake, o sleeper and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you life (Eph 5:14). The poor have good news preached to them: not only the literally poor, but the poor in spirit, all those whose hearts are open to their need for God and the coming of His Christ. These are the six signs offered to the Baptist, and to us. But there is also a seventh sign: blessed is he who takes no offence at me. The word offence can also be translated scandal, and the scandal is the Cross: a scandal to Jews and folly to Gentiles (1 Cor 1:23).

Now Jesus poses a series of six questions. They are symbolic questions inviting the people around Him to consider their attraction to the preaching of John the Baptist. Fragile reeds and rich raiment suggest that they might be seeking weakness or fragility in the message, or the opposite: a way to worldly success and riches. The prophetic message of John, however, is of another order. He has the supreme privilege of drawing back the veil to reveal the face of He who comes. But John’s importance fades before the everlasting joy (words of the first reading) of those who enter fully in the kingdom of heaven.