Friday in the 24th Week of Ordinary Time, September 16, 2022

Luke 8, 1-3

Jesus journeyed from one town and village to another, preaching and proclaiming the good news of the Kingdom of God. Accompanying him were the Twelve and some women who had been cured of evil spirits and infirmities, Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out, Joanna, the wife of Herod’s steward Chuza, Susanna, and many others who provided for them out of their resources.

“Jesus journeyed from one town and village to another, etc.”  The first verse of today’s Gospel Reading sums up the work the Lord Jesus did in the three years of his Public Life, and it sounds like a very simple statement.  However, St. Luke was writing his Gospel for Gentiles who experienced something very different with their own teachers.  First of all, the Greek teachers and philosophers  did not travel about spreading their doctrines and speculations.  They remained where they lived, for the most part, and taught their, usually outside.  They also did not teach crowds of ordinary people.  They taught a few students at any given time.  They also did not tend to teach religious truths.  Aristotle’s teachings on ethics, for instance, did not cite the gods as an example to be followed, nor did he ever give instructions on how the gods were to be worshipped.  The Lord Jesus moved about constantly, taught very large crowds, and taught mostly exclusively how to live and how to please God.  For the Greeks for whom Luke wrote, Jesus came as something very new.  

Now, at the time of Luke’s writing, various foreign cults were popping up in Rome and in the provinces.  The cult of Mithras, which had its origins in Persia, offered mystical enlightenment, but its teachings were restricted only to the initiates.  Likewise, the cult of the Great Mother, from Asia Minor; the cult of Isis and Osiris, from Egypt; and the Eleusian mysteries.  The promoters of these cults did not teach non-initiates and had no special interest in right behavior.  They cloaked their teachings in complicated myths which had no historical basis and relied on their exotic origins and strange phrasings to lure in the gullible.  Nor did these various cults allow in just anyone.  The cult of Mithras was for military men.  The cult of the Great Mother only admitted women.  And we can readily imagine that the poor were not welcome at all.

Thus, Luke, with this simple verse, makes a clear distinction between the Lord and the philosophers and cult leaders of the time.  Furthermore, Luke highlights the presence and aid of women among the followers of Jesus: “Mary, called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had gone out, Joanna, the wife of Herod’s steward Chuza, Susanna, and many others.”  He names only the most prominent of them.  It is interesting that Luke names Mary Magdalene, “from whom seven demons had gone out”, before the others, as though she had a higher place among them, just as the Evangelists always named Peter first in their lists of the Apostles.  Possibly this was a nod to the important role she would play in the events of the Resurrection.  

And so men and women, rich and poor, educated and not, followed the Lord Jesus.  He preached to them all without distinction and healed Gentiles and Jews alike of their sicknesses.  His teachings were simple, and he used everyday experience to illustrate the points he was making.  Luke never feels the need to explain the Lord’s teachings after he has quoted them.  We give Almighty God thanks for sending his Son to us in this way: not as someone unapproachable or incomprehensible, but someone who welcomed even children into his embrace.