1 Following in the footsteps of many who have taken the initiative of composing an account of the events that have taken place among us, 2 according to what has been handed down to us by eyewitnesses and all those who have become preachers of the word, 3 I too have decided, after closely following everything that has happened since the beginning, to write them down carefully, respecting a certain sequence, all for you, dearest Theophilus. 4 My aim is to make you aware of the solidity of the catechesis you have received.

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14 Filled with the power of the Spirit, Jesus returned to Galilee. And his reputation spread throughout the region. 15 For Jesus taught in their synagogues, and people praised him.

16 Then one day he came to Nazareth, where he had grown up, and as was his custom, he entered the synagogue on the Sabbath. He got up to read. 17 He was given the scroll of the prophet Isaiah. After unrolling the text, he found the passage where it says: 18 "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has chosen me to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to lead the oppressed to freedom, 19 to proclaim a favorable year from the Lord. 20 Having rolled up the text and handed it to the servant, he sat down. All in the synagogue had their eyes fixed on him. 21 Jesus began to say to them: "This passage of Scripture that you have just heard has come true today."

Isn't human history a vast hospital?

His name is André¹. Many years ago, while working as a psycho-educator in a Montreal rehabilitation center, he realized that a young girl in his care was chronically undernourished. So he came up with the idea of creating a food bank that would not only offer food to those struggling to feed themselves, but also tackle food waste. The Moisson Montreal organization was born and would spread throughout Quebec. Not only was this good news for the hungry, it was also good news for the ecologically-minded.

Then, a few years later, realizing that human beings were being wasted, and that people were losing all self-esteem, he decided to tackle social reintegration, to get people back to work who had been excluded and had no hope of ever getting back. He founded the Renaissance group, which would operate thrift stores, boutiques, bookstores and donation centers almost everywhere in Quebec. The idea was to have an economic activity that would give the non-profit organization the means to hire workers to restore their self-confidence. What started out as a social integration enterprise has evolved over the years into a true social economy enterprise with a strong environmental component. The initiative has been a phenomenal success, employing 1,500 people today. What good news for people looking for work, especially immigrants. It's good news for the environment too, as Renaissance has also become a leading player in the circular economy and the environment, diverting over 27,000 tonnes of goods a year from landfill.

There's nothing better than hearing good news, especially when the atmosphere is gloomy, as it often is. Have we forgotten that the Greek word for "gospel" means "good news"? And it's good news that Luke intends to share in today's story.

We're familiar with the story of Jesus' journey to Nazareth, the town where he was raised, and standing up on the Sabbath in the synagogue to read from the prophet Isaiah. Luke cites this passage from Isaiah 61:1-2a, where the prophet says he has been sent by God to bring good news to the poor, the broken-hearted, the captives and the prisoners, and to proclaim a Sabbatical year, i.e. for the Jews, every seven years the freeing of slaves, and every 50 years, the freeing from all debts. Isaiah's context is the year 520 (BC), when the Jews have been back from the Babylonian exile for a few years, the sacrificial altar has been set up and the temple is about to be rebuilt, life has stabilized, and the population is growing. Luke cites the Greek translation of the Hebrew text, known as the Septuagint, which no longer speaks of prisoners, but rather of the blind. The idea is the same: just as the prophet Isaiah proclaims healing and happiness to all the afflicted in God's name, Jesus does the same for his audience in Nazareth. And Luke insists: "All this is happening today."

How should we react to such an account? First of all, we need to understand the context in which Luke places this story. We are at the very beginning of Jesus' ministry, after his baptism and the story of his temptations. But rather than following Mark's sequence of Jesus proclaiming in the Capernaum region that the kingdom of God has come near, that everyone needs to change one's life and to believe the good news as he begins to choose his disciples, Luke opts instead to bring Jesus into Nazareth, as Mark will do much later (in ch. 6). And there, in Nazareth, Jesus' homeland, Luke puts into his mouth a keynote speech that sums up his mission. What, then, is Luke's intention with such an approach?

By making this speech Jesus' first major action, Luke gives it priority. In fact, this speech defines the direction Jesus mission will take. And the rest of Luke's Gospel reflects this direction. Just think of Luke's own accounts of Jesus' compassion for the widow who lost her only son, the Good Samaritan, the woman bent over for 18 years, the Prodigal Son, Lazarus, Zacchaeus, the Good Thief; the poor occupy a central place in his gospel, starting with the childhood story. The good news is for today: to Zacchaeus Jesus says, "Today salvation has come to this house"; to the good thief he says, "Today you will be with me in Paradise". So, for Luke, Jesus didn't preach morality first and foremost, he preached healing and happiness to people broken by life.

But once we've grasped all this, we may be left wanting more. After all, how many people in Jesus' time were actually healed and experienced the good news? And if we were to update Jesus' keynote address, what would the good news be today? For an unemployed person, it's finding a permanent job with a good salary. For a cancer patient, it would be to learn that the cancer has completely disappeared. For a battered woman in a toxic relationship with a partner, it's being able to rebuild her personality and return to a healthy environment. For a homeless person, it's finding a place to live and a community to support them. For a person addicted to drugs or alcohol, it means being able to free themselves from this dependency and regain their full stature as men and women. For Ukrainians, Palestinians, Sudanese and Lebanese, it would be the end of war. The list of good news wishes could go on and on. In such a context, what is the meaning of Jesus' programmatic speech as presented by Luke, especially with the remark: "Today is the day when all this will come true"? Are we looking at a daydream?

In my opinion, the key to understand the whole thing lies at the very beginning of today's story, when Luke writes: "Filled with the power of the Spirit, Jesus returned to Galilee". He is referring here to the breath of love and compassion that comes from God, which was the driving force behind Jesus' mission and proclamation of the Good News, and which can be the driving force behind our lives if we are willing to open ourselves to it. For this is the brutal question that arises in the face of everything that bothers us, in the face of any suffering or any painful or aggressive situation: how do we react? At that moment, we have the choice of either facing up to the situation and taking the long, patient path of love and compassion that opens the door to healing for all, or denying reality and seeking to exterminate what's upsetting us, creating even more wounds. André, in our story from the beginning, when he saw the malnourished girl or the people without work, looked the situation in the face, and the strength of his love and compassion were the source of his initiatives. When Hamas supporters say, "We must eliminate Israel", or Jewish settlers say, "We must eliminate the Palestinians", they have made their choice, a choice that creates a no-win situation. It's the same thing for people who, faced with the homeless, would like to exterminate them by throwing them in a dustbin far from the city; just as we wish the problem didn't exist, a problem that makes our cities ugly.

The good news of today's gospel is that this force of love and compassion is at work in the hearts of many people. It was at work in the volunteers who risked their lives to join the convoy to feed Gaza. It is at work in our daily lives, in the face of all the challenges that await us, and in all our choices, including our political choices. It is at work in people in authority, who may or may not be open to it in their decisions. But to truly welcome this good news, we have to accept that we and our world need healing, for it's not easy to change a heart of stone into a heart of flesh.

In short, the human story is like a vast hospital, where we can be both healer and needing care (even without knowing). How does this relate to the good news spoken of in Luke's Gospel? Just as it's good news when a sick person is cared for by a doctor who provides the appropriate care, so our world is cared for by this breath of love and compassion poured into the hearts of a multitude. In Nazareth, unfortunately, only a few knew how to welcome this good news. Where do we stand?

 

-André Gilbert, Gatineau, November 2024

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¹ This story was published in (French) La Presse (Montreal, Canada) by Jean-Philippe Décarie, October 30, 2024. For the full text: 30 years of Renaissance