Augustine For Today
January 25 – Conversion of Saint Paul
Let us confidently acknowledge and openly declare that Christ was crucified for our sake, proclaiming it with pride and joy, not with fear and shame. The apostle Paul saw in this reason for boasting. He could have told us many great and holy things about Christ: how as God he shared with his Father the work of creation, and how as man like us he was master of the world. But he would not glory in any of these wonderful things. God forbid that I should boast of anything, he said, except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,
Sermon 218C
Third Sunday of Ordinary Time • Year C
Can you imagine what those final words of Jesus that we hear today might have meant to the people gathered in the little synagogue of Nazareth on that Sabbath day two thousand years ago! In fact, if we were to have continued reading we would have heard that initially their reaction was very positive. They spoke highly of Jesus and were amazed at the gracious words that came from his mouth. But they were also a little puzzled, for these were his neighbors; they had watched him grow up; he had played with their children; they knew him well and so wondered what this carpenter, the son of Joseph and Mary, could mean by “this passage is now fulfilled!”