We are called to self-knowledge by Jesus. It can be strange to realise that we have been looking at life, and other people, through the filter of our own prejudices, our own mental baggage, the accumulation of our individual and less than perfect history. Our experience, good and bad, and the impact of our experience constitute in large measure the glasses, the spectacles, through which we see the world and regard other people [ … ]

It is as if to say: nothing that we hold in our heart of hearts is secret; nothing that we think is invisible; all that we are exists and is active in our relationships with others. Just as God sees through to the core of our being, so we inevitably share all we are with all other people in our lives, influencing their lives because they are in communion with us [ … ]

We learn so much about our true relationship with God and with other people in these Gospel verses. Perhaps we might say rather, we are reminded of so much, because these are Christian truths we have long been taught and have long known, but which often are neglected and forgotten. We are recalled in these Gospel verses to Christian truth [ … ]

Up until this point, Luke has told us several times that Jesus taught the people, but he has not told us what Jesus was teaching. This is the first time that Luke in his Gospel shares with us the teachings of Jesus. Jesus gives four blessings, four Beatitudes, and four curses. We are drawn to the heart of Jesus’ teaching, and must sharply reflect on what we are taught here [ … ]

Luke’s Gospel places the calling of the first disciples after the fame of Jesus has already spread across the region. Simon Peter listens to Jesus’ words, then he experiences the miraculous catch of fish, and then he throws himself down before Jesus, acknowledging his sins and placing his life in Jesus’ hands. This is Simon Peter’s call. He gives away everything he has to follow Jesus [ … ]

The Christians living in Jerusalem wanted no part of the Jewish Rebellion and, remembering Jesus’ prophecy, fled Jerusalem as the Romans advanced. They avoided the slaughter, and for this there arose enmity between Christians and those Jews who adhered to the old Law. There was a parting of the ways. The Jews went to rebuild their religion, led by the Pharisees and along exclusive lines, never more to be centred on Temple worship. The Jewish Christian Church which had been in Jerusalem waned – the Temple had been of great importance to Jerusalem Christians also. Henceforth, the Church would become more and more of the Gentiles [ … ]

The poor widow’s offering of two small coins in the Temple is to Jesus the greatest gift of all, because it is offered out of her poverty – it is money she really needed for herself – and with a pure spirit of love and generosity [ … ]

The Sadducees are explicitly held up for criticism in the Gospels less often than the Pharisees, even though they provided the elite which ran the Temple. This is partly because, with the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple in AD 70, the Sadducees were wiped out as a force in Jewish religious life and politics. The Judaism which survived, to regroup and forge a new identity, was that of the Pharisees. Consequently, when there were rivalries between Jews and Christians, it was the Pharisees with whom Christians would find themselves in conflict, and this would colour the memory of earlier times [ … ]

One thing that emerges here is how understanding of Christ’s meaning develops and matures with time and through recollection. The people have flocked to hear Jesus’ teaching, and in Jerusalem he has a very attentive audience – of ‘all’ the people. Jesus continues, however, to speak in a veiled way, his parables deliberately concealing a part of his meaning, relating to his own divinity, to his accomplishing the inauguration of the Kingdom of God, and the great self-sacrifice to expiate our sins he is called to make [ … ]

Jesus is so very sorry for a city and a people he loves that he must weep at the sight of Jerusalem. Here is the centre of Jewish faith, while the Jews are the people to whom he has directed most of his teaching, and they are the first chosen people of God [ … ]

In Jericho, we approach the end of Jesus’ journey. It was in Jericho that the long road of exodus of forty years in the desert ended. For Jesus and his fellow pilgrims, this is the last stage before the ascent to Jerusalem. Jesus’ mission on Earth is soon to be complete [ … ]