Friday in the 31st Week of Ordinary Time, Friday, November 7, 2025

Romans 15, 14-21

I myself am convinced about you, my brothers and sisters, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able to admonish one another. But I have written to you rather boldly in some respects to remind you, because of the grace given me by God to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles in performing the priestly service of the Gospel of God, so that the offering up of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the Holy Spirit. In Christ Jesus, then, I have reason to boast in what pertains to God. For I will not dare to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to lead the Gentiles to obedience by word and deed, by the power of signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God, so that from Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum I have finished preaching the Gospel of Christ. Thus I aspire to proclaim the Gospel not where Christ has already been named, so that I do not build on another’s foundation, but as it is written: Those who have never been told of him shall see, and those who have never heard of him shall understand.

In these verses we see St. Paul near the end of his letter, speaking with a gentleness that could only belong to one who knows his authority springs not from pride but from grace.  He writes, “I myself am convinced about you, that you yourselves are full of goodness, filled with all knowledge, and able to admonish one another.”  These are not empty compliments.  Paul recognizes the maturity of the Roman Church.  Yet, as a true pastor, he also knows that memory fades and zeal cools; so he says, “I have written to you rather boldly… to remind you.”  His boldness is not a rebuke but a service  — the friendly urgency of one who tends the flame of faith in others.

Then Paul discloses something luminous: his ministry is a “priestly service of the Gospel of God.”  This is not metaphor.  He sees himself as a priest at an altar, offering up the Gentiles themselves as a living sacrifice, sanctified by the Holy Spirit.  The imagery unites the worlds of temple and mission: the Word he preaches becomes the sacrificial fire that purifies the nations.  Evangelization, in Paul’s understanding, is liturgy; and conversion is the transformation of the human heart into an oblation pleasing to God.

The apostle’s self-understanding, therefore, is profoundly sacerdotal.  He is not the author of the Gospel but its minister — one who mediates the presence of the crucified and risen Christ.  His “boasting” is carefully circumscribed: “In Christ Jesus, then, I have reason to boast in what pertains to God.”  In other words, his joy is not in his labor but in what God has accomplished through him.  Paul’s humility lies not in denying his work but in recognizing its true source.  He sees his whole life as a vessel of grace through which Christ acts, speaks, and saves.

When he recounts that “from Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum I have finished preaching the Gospel,” we glimpse both the magnitude of his mission and the unity of his vision.  The arc from east to west marks not merely geography but theology: the Gospel is a single radiant circle, beginning in the city of David and stretching outward until all peoples share in Israel’s promises.  The world becomes one vast sanctuary where the nations themselves are the offering.

Paul’s next words reveal the spiritual engine of the missionary heart: “I aspire to proclaim the Gospel not where Christ has already been named.”  Here we encounter the holy restlessness of the apostle.  He cannot abide the thought that any soul should live without the name of Jesus.  His vocation is centrifugal — ever moving outward to the frontiers where light meets darkness.  Yet even this zeal is ordered by humility: “so that I do not build on another’s foundation.”  He honors the labors of others; he will not claim what is theirs.  His only desire is to plant the Cross where no one has yet seen it.

Finally, Paul quotes Isaiah: “Those who have never been told of Him shall see, and those who have never heard shall understand.”  In that single sentence, the prophet’s vision and the Apostle’s mission converge.  It is God Himself who longs to be known, who seeks the farthest hearts and calls them home.  Paul is but the instrument of that divine yearning — the voice that carries the Word into the silent places of the world.

To read these verses is to feel the beating pulse of the Church’s missionary soul.  Every believer, in some measure, shares this priestly calling: to make one’s life an offering through which others may glimpse the mercy of Christ.  Whether by word, deed, or prayer, each of us participates in that same sacred service of the Gospel, until those who have never been told shall see, and those who have never heard shall understand.