First they ignore it, then they laugh at it, then they say they knew it all along.

"We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of the siren, till she transforms us into beasts. " – Patrick Henry: (1736 – 1799: A Founding Father of the United States of America)

Gospel Text: ( MK 6:1-6)

Jesus departed from there and came to his native place, accompanied by his disciples.

When the sabbath came he began to teach in the synagogue,

and many who heard him were astonished.

They said, “Where did this man get all this?

What kind of wisdom has been given him?

What mighty deeds are wrought by his hands!

Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary,

and the brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon?

And are not his sisters here with us?”

And they took offense at him.

Jesus said to them,

“A prophet is not without honor except in his native place

and among his own kin and in his own house.”

So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there,

apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them.

He was amazed at their lack of faith.

Have you ever experienced rejection at any point in your life? I have and it could be very disheartening especially when you have genuine intentions, when you mean good, when your entire disposition is to help and never to hinder; rejection is a very painful and harrowing experience.

We discover from the above passage that our Lord was not discouraged by the rejection; he remained in the game. If we reason carefully we will see that the rejection was an effort to discourage him and bring his mission to an abrupt premature end. Often when we face rejection we eject ourselves; this is wrong.

Is Jesus Christ still being rejected in our day and age? As an individual do I in any way reject Jesus Christ? The truth is that Jesus Christ is still being rejected by many in various ways. We reject Jesus when we fail to trust and obey him. We reject Jesus Christ when we hear the word of God and fail to put it into practice. We reject Jesus Christ in our neighbors, we reject Jesus Christ in the poor, we reject Jesus Christ in some of our daily choices, we reject Jesus in our disconnection from the sacraments (how many of us will be willing to receive him in the most blessed sacrament today?) we reject Jesus when we are more interested in the flesh than in the spiritual; we also reject him in our failure to love others as God loves us.

In today’s gospel passage imagine how the Nazarenes' lives would have changed if they had approached Jesus with faith. Keeping this in mind we should ask daily, as the disciples did: «Lord, increase our faith» (Lk 17,5), so as we may open ourselves more and more and let His love work in us.