Light to see and strength to love

Today's Gospel offers us several profound themes. We see our Lord settling in the city of Capernaum and founding there the base of his public ministry. St. Matthew interprets this move as the fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy: “...".“The land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, on the way to the sea, on the other side of the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. The people who dwelt in darkness have seen a great light; to those who dwelt in the land and shadows of death a light has shone.".

By his presence alone, Jesus brings light to the people. Through his preaching, he brings the light of conversion. This light allows us to examine our lives honestly, to recognize our inadequacy and our sin, and to discover anew the path that leads us back to him.

We see the immediate effect of this light in the following scene. Jesus meets two brothers by the Sea of Galilee - Peter and Andrew - and calls them. They follow him without hesitation. Capernaum, so central in the ministry of Christ, was also the land of these first called apostles. There they met Christ and received their vocation. They saw his light and experienced their own “conversion,” so to speak, in choosing to follow him. Every true conversion must always lead to following Christ. The readiness with which they left their nets and their father teaches us that neither material goods nor human relationships should become obstacles to conversion, or to following Christ. To follow God's plan, we need light to see the way and strength to want to unite ourselves to God's will, as Peter and Andrew did.

Peter and Andrew had their Capernaum; Paul had the light that met him on the road to Damascus. His conversion matured in his encounter with Christ and radically changed his life. What happened to him on the road to Damascus was thanks to divine light. Each of us also has our own “Capernaum”: that place where the light of God unexpectedly breaks into our ordinary activities. 

Today also concludes the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and, providentially, this Sunday, January 25, is the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul. The question that Paul addressed to the Corinthians must also challenge us: “Is Christ divided?”. Let us continue to pray fervently for Christian unity. “Each one goes around saying: ”I am of Paul, I am of Apollos, I am of Cephas, I am of Christ. Is Christ divided?.

We can make our own the prayer that the Church proposes in the liturgy for the feast of St. Lawrence of Brindisi: “Lord God, [...] the spirit of counsel and strength; [...] grant us to come to know, in that same spirit, the things we must do and the grace to put them into practice after knowing them.".