Christ Blessing the Children,
Lucas Cranach, the Younger, 1540s

Readings
Wisdom 2:12,17-20 
Psalm 54:3-8 
James 3:16-4:3 
Mark 9:30-37 

Chants

In today’s First Reading, it’s like we have our ears pressed to the wall and can hear the murderous grumblings of the elders, chief priests and scribes who last week Jesus predicted would torture and kill Him (see Mark 8:31; 10:33-34). 

The liturgy invites us to see this passage from the Book of Wisdom as a prophecy of the Lord’s Passion. We hear His enemies complain that “the Just One” has challenged their authority, reproached them for breaking the law of Moses, for betraying their training as leaders and teachers. 

And we hear chilling words that foreshadow how they will mock Him as He hangs on the cross: “For if the Just One be the Son of God, He will ... deliver Him.” (compare Matthew 27:41-43). 

Today’s Gospel and Psalm give us the flip side of the First Reading. In both, we hear of Jesus’ sufferings from His point of view. Though His enemies surround Him, He offers himself freely in sacrifice, trusting that God will sustain Him. 

But the apostles today don’t understand this second announcement of Christ’s passion. They begin arguing over issues of succession—over who among them is greatest, who will be chosen to lead after Christ is killed. 

Again they are thinking not as God, but as human beings (see Mark 8:33). And again Jesus teaches the Twelve—the chosen leaders of His Church—that they must lead by imitating His example of love and self-sacrifice. They must be “servants of all,” especially the weak and the helpless symbolized by the child He embraces and places in their midst. 

This is a lesson for us, too. We must have the mind of Christ, who humbled himself to come among us (see Philippians 2:5-11). We must freely offer ourselves, making everything we do a sacrifice in praise of His name. 

As James says in today’s Epistle, we must seek wisdom from above, desiring humility not glory, and in all things be gentle and full of mercy.

_______________

Saint Leo the Great
from Sixth Sermon for Christmas

The infancy that God's majesty did not disdain reached mature manhood through his advance in years. Then, when the triumph of his passion and resurrection were completed, all the actions of his lowly state, which he adopted for love of us, became a thing of the past. Nevertheless, the feast of his nativity renews for us Jesus' first moments, born of the Virgin Mary, and when we adore the birth of the Savior we find we are celebrating the origin of our own life.

For the birth of Christ is the source of life for all Christian people and the birthday of the Head is the birthday of the body. True, each individual who is called takes his place in his own proper order and the Church's offspring appear at different periods of time. But just as the entire body of the faithful, born in the font of baptism, is crucified with Christ in his passion, raised again in his resurrection, and placed at the Father's right hand in his ascension, so they are born with him in his nativity.

Any believer, from any part of the world, who is born again in Christ, having abandoned the sinful ways retained from his first beginnings, becomes a new person through his second birth. No longer does he belong to his father's ancestry according to the flesh but to our Savior's race. For he became Son of man that we might become sons of God.

Pope Benedict XVI
from Angelus Address, September 24, 2006

In this Sunday's Gospel, for the second time Jesus proclaims his passion, death and Resurrection to the disciples (cf. Mk 9: 30-31). The Evangelist Mark highlights the strong contrast between his mindset and that of the Twelve Apostles, who not only do not understand the Teacher's words and clearly reject the idea that he is doomed to encounter death (cf. Mk 8: 32), but also discuss which of them is to be considered "the greatest" (Mk 9: 34).

Jesus patiently explains his logic to them, the logic of love that makes itself service to the point of the gift of self: "If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all" (Mk 9: 35).

This is the logic of Christianity, which responds to the truth about man created in the image of God, but at the same time contrasts with human selfishness, a consequence of original sin. Every human person is attracted by love - which ultimately is God himself - but often errs in the concrete ways of loving; thus, an originally positive tendency but one polluted by sin can give rise to evil intentions and actions.

In today's Liturgy, this is also recalled in the Letter of St James: "Wherever jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice. But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, without uncertainty or insincerity". And the Apostle concludes: "The harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace" (Jas 3: 16-18).

These words call to mind the witness of so many Christians who humbly and silently spend their lives serving others for the sake of the Lord Jesus, behaving in practice as servants of love, and hence, "artisans" of peace.

Sometimes, certain people are asked for the supreme testimony of blood, which also happened a few days ago to the Italian Religious, Sr Leonella Sgorbati, who died a victim of violence. This Sister, who served the poor and the lowly in Somalia for many years, died with the words "I forgive" on her lips: this is the most genuine Christian witness, a peaceful sign of contradiction that demonstrates the victory of love over hatred and evil.

There is no doubt that following Christ is difficult, but, as he says, only those who lose their life for his sake and the Gospel's will save it (cf. Mk 8: 35), giving full meaning to their existence. There is no other way of being his disciples, there is no other way of witnessing to his love and striving for Gospel perfection.