21/09/2023

St Matthew was a tax collector. This does not mean that he had a secure, pensionable job in the Roman Civil Service. To meet the job description for such a post in the Roman Empire you had to provide the amount demanded by the Governor and then by force squeeze it and your profit out of the population little by little. You had to be the mean and merciless master of the parable of the talents.

"He got up and followed". I can visualise Jesus strolling with his friends to Peter's place where they were going to have their simple meal together. They passed by the seated publican with whom the disciples  avoided eye contact. He was feared by all and  only loved by his family. Perhaps he had heard gossip about this stranger who was coming towards him with some fishermen he knew and collected from. He heard the words. He did what he was told.

Of course, it might have been just an invitation to join the gathering to which Jesus had been invited. But in the context of the  Gospel and the Life of Jesus it was much more.It was a vocation, a call to change his way of life. Matthew, himself, accepted it as such.

When Jesus replies to the Pharisees he does not win debates, although it sometimes seems like that. His life is spent in teaching the way to heaven. By his humanity he is a Jew with all that entailed in the First Century. He knows the depths of the Law and consistently corrects the errors of the rigorous scrupulosity that had corrupted it.

St Matthew, a grasping servant of Mammon accepts his spiritual vocation. St Paul, a rigorist Pharisee had been given an insight into the meaning of "the glory of the resurrection" and today confirms to his converts that Father, Son and Holy Spirit wants only "mercy not sacrifice" and this is "selflessness, gentleness and patience" for this is "the peace that binds us together" The Love that is our God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.

Dear Lord you know how much better I feel when my thoughts and prayers arise unbidden out of my heart. You know what I am trying to say. You first and let the rest follow. May Mary who must have witnessed more of your public life than the wedding feast at Cana continue to pray with St Paul, St Matthew and all the saints that all of us on Earth accept our lives as a vocation to fulfill the will of God and with grace won for us respond accordingly. Amen