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Who do you say that I am?
Mahatma Gandhi famously remarked once, ‘I like your Christ; I do not like your Christians.’ As a young man he had gone to work in South Africa. While in that country he studied the Christian scriptures. He was so inspired by what he read that he decided one Sunday to attend a Christian Church and join in the worship of the people.
As soon as he entered the building he was confronted by a sign which read, ‘whites to the left; negroes and coloureds to the right.’ He was so infuriated by the obvious affront to the message of Christ in a Christian place of worship that he never returned.
Christ poses a challenging question to his followers in our Gospel - Who do you say I am? And the world continues to pose that question to those of us who would claim to be His followers. Despite all the negativity which has surrounded the Church people still have a fascination with Christ. They want to know about Him; they seek to encounter Him.
Pope Paul VI said that the world has more need of witnesses than of teachers. He meant that the Gospel is most effectively preached by actions rather than words.
Like it or not we proclaim to the world who we think Christ is by the way we choose to live our lives. It is a daunting thought that people will seek to know Christ in and through the actions of his followers. When we are brash, impatient or unkind, we distort the face of Christ for others.
Robert Louis Stevenson wrote: be careful how you act; you may be the only Bible that someone will ever read!
Christ’s question in our Gospel is a challenge not so much to what I say, but to the quality of my actions. But you, who do you say I am?
Fr. Ruairi O’Domhnaill, Newbridge
Gospel reading can be found at Catholic Ireland.net |
