Please read the Scripture passage before the homily.
We begin a series of readings from the gospel according to Luke. Luke seems to be writing primarily to Gentile Christians. He has a way of bring Gentiles into the scope of the Old Testament as it refers to Christ. Luke also emphasizes God’s mercy in sending Jesus.
In today’s passage, Jesus has come to Nazareth, his hometown. It must have been good for his own people to hear about liberty for captives, sight for the blind, freedom for the oppressed and a year of God’s favor.
What would delight Gentiles would be hearing about a pagan widow near Sidon and a pagan leper from Syria. This, however, received a hostile reaction from Jesus’ own people, and they tried to drive him out of town.
Our Jesus has come to save us. He has also come to save everyone else, because he is not our Jesus only, but theirs as well. You know those Chinese, Russian, North Koreans, and the Islamic fundamentalists? Jesus is their savior as well as ours. There are holy Chinese, Russians, North Koreans, Islamic fundamentalists as well as holy Europeans and peoples from the Americas.
We are now in the synagogue at Nazareth and the carpenter’s son has just given us our homily. The son of a carpenter is likewise the Son of God. Do we accept his word as the word of God or as merely a human word? Are we from Nazareth or from the whole world?