A Reflection for the Wednesday of the Twenty-fifth Week in Ordinary Time
By Ashley McKinless
Find today’s readings here.
“Jesus summoned the Twelve and gave them power and authority
over all demons and to cure diseases,
and he sent them to proclaim the Kingdom of God
and to heal the sick” (Lk 9:1-2).
My first real reporting assignment for America came in the fall of 2016. I went to Guatemala and Honduras with Catholic Relief Services to report on the root causes of migration to the United States. And I was in over my head. I had written plenty of articles in my first three years at the magazine, but all from the safety of my desk. I hadn’t taken a single journalism class or written for my college newspaper. The idea of interviewing strangers, in another language no less, filled me with dread. I hardly felt qualified to go to another country to ask people experiencing levels of poverty and repression completely alien to me to trust me with their stories.
I imagine the disciples initially felt a similar trepidation when they were sent by Jesus to cast out demons and cure disease. What struck me in reading today’s reading from Luke, “The Mission of the Twelve,” is its placement in the Gospel. It comes relatively early. The last time we saw the disciples they were in a boat afraid for their lives. Jesus calms the seas and asks them, “Where is your faith?” The disciples, filled with awe, ask, “Who then is this, who commands even the winds and the sea, and they obey him?” (Lk 8:22-25). They still don’t fully understand who this fellow Jesus is.
And next thing we know, Jesus is giving them “power and authority” and sending them into mission territory with “neither walking stick, nor sack, nor food, nor money.” Who could blame them for feeling in over their heads?
Yet Jesus entrusted them with his mission, even though they still had a great deal to learn and even though they would not always succeed. The Gospel suggests they had a mixed record. Jesus tells the Twelve, “As for those who do not welcome you, when you leave that town, shake the dust from your feet in testimony against them.”
They couldn’t reach everyone. But still, they “went from village to village proclaiming the Good News and curing diseases.”
This Gospel reminds us that Jesus trusts us to share in his mission, too, even when we feel underqualified and even when we fail.
In Guatemala and Honduras, at a deportation processing center, in migrant shelters and on the farm of a coffee cooperative, speaking in broken Spanish and through interpreters, I tried my best to understand the desperation that sends thousands of people to the U.S.-Mexico border. Not everyone wanted to talk to me. But those who did speak told stories of hope and resilience that I had the privilege of passing on, contributing in whatever minuscule way to greater understanding and solidarity across our continent.
Our faith cannot always be lived out from behind a desk alone. Getting out and spreading the Gospel can be daunting, especially when we feel we are not particularly worthy messengers. But Jesus missioned the Twelve knowing they were not perfect and that they would fail him, even abandon him in his darkest hour. We share in that same mission today.
