The renunciation of pride - and the ‘nose’ without citizenship

(Mk 10:13-16)

After the astonishing advice on equality in the relationship between man and woman, Jesus ups the ante by proclaiming not only the dignity of relationships between adults and children, but also between community veterans and incipients.

For the first of the class, the Kingdom of God was their thing and their work. It did not come to mankind as a Gift - first to be received - but (according to the pattern) it was necessary to attain it by corresponding observances and merits.

In the Gospel passage Christ does not speak of irresponsible childishness - a criterion unfortunately abused in asceticism (and one that makes one devoid of pride)...

No one can occupy the Lord's role on earth, simply because He remains Present and Coming; not manipulative.

If we become simple and children we are only so before God: no institution can be a substitute for Jesus.

In the past, a humanly evasive Christology has unfortunately matched a triumphalist ecclesiology.

Before it - especially in provincial or mission territories - the people considered puerile could sometimes fulfil it with uncritical fideism. At most, he utters some babble (mystical or formulaic).

At the time of Jesus, failure to observe the rules of purity excluded from worship and social life both infidels and those considered unfaithful or adulterous, despite the fact that they bore clear witness to solid charity.

The Greek term used - paidìon-paidìa diminutive of pàis - indicated an age between 8-12 years, typical of shop boys and servants who in the home had to take orders from others (even strangers).

The Master took these children as an example of helpfulness, primarily for his zealous Apostles.

The latter in fact did not immediately and spontaneously enter into the way of God's familiar... as an authentic believer would into that of the Father.

Only those who have the openness of children can welcome salvation, because they feel small, remain receptive, humbly know how to start again and even from below.

Jesus identifies himself with the infirm (v.16). And in no uncertain terms he even intends to propose them to veteran followers!

This is precisely to indicate the kind of believer he dreams of them becoming (v.15): the person who recognises the legitimate desires of others, and does not make too much fuss if he sees himself diminished in social consideration.

Church leaders not infrequently already from the earliest times felt themselves to be experts and self-sufficient ...

Conversely, they must be ready in Christ Jesus to be born again and again, otherwise their eye will remain sick with a caricatured and blocked vision of the Kingdom.

Those who do not trust the Father's plan will not proceed with spontaneity and generosity: they will only move forward if reassured upstream, playing a stagnant character, or a well-reciprocated task.

On the other hand, the small and inadequate person has far fewer mental reservations - as well as fewer practical ballasts: he throws himself genuinely and enthusiastically into the enterprises of the Faith adventure.

All this while for the 'elect' (even of the official Church) the 'uncertain' do not count or represent anything - if not a frame sometimes useful to make numbers, but often also annoying.

Before the distant ones could approach actual inward acceptance (or mere consideration), the Judaizers wanted to subject those who approached the threshold of the churches to a lengthy, artificial examination.

It was a kind of discipline of the arcane (typical of the various devotions) and a nerve-wracking rigmarole of code and casuistry corrections - all to be verified over time.

Jesus, on the other hand, is not averse to 'touching' directly (v.13) those considered unclean, women, little boys or their mothers: an obscenity according to the ritual norms of the time.

Women and children - along with heathens - were considered untrustworthy and impure beings by nature, indeed defiling.

The Master has no fear of transgressing the religious law, or of being assessed as infected Himself!

The Kingdom does not belong to the sterilised who haunt the lives of others with precepts of legal impurity; futile, external, hypocritical, senseless minutiae.

Christ embraces, blesses, lays his hand on the servants - as if to recognise them and truly consecrate them - taking into himself the unpromoted of the 'synagogues' of the time: he mirrors himself in them as if he were one of them.

It means that the disciples' concern must not be that of traditional re-education, common to all the various more or less mysterious creeds of the time.

Indeed, the most eloquent sign of the Kingdom of God on earth is precisely the welcoming spirit of the marginalised: those who do not even know what it means to claim rights only for themselves.Incidentally - as we well experience simply by observing our own realities - the discarded are not infrequently better introduced into the practice of even summary charity than those who hold roles of disembodied prestige.

Pretensions and mere sophistry degrade the concreteness of discipleship. They exclude the specific value of the new Kingdom, to the point of transforming and corrupting it - turning it upside down into caricature.

The quality of Life in the Spirit is measured by the ability to recover the opposite sides in each believer who has the desire to walk towards his or her own completeness.

Thus, in Community this dynamic of recovery increases and recovers thanks to the integration that becomes a fruitful conviviality of differences.

Welcoming, accommodating the weak, the distant, the small and the excluded is personal and communal enrichment - an eloquent sign of the same life and divine character in us and in the Church. Not a winning institution, but a servant of humanity in need of everything.

And it is precisely the little ones - totally deprived of the spirit of selfhood - who become in Christ professors of the adults, that is to say, of life-long leaders, chiefs, veterans and super-Apostles.

This is the angelic modesty and evangelical littleness that makes us emancipated and immediately equal; but above all happy, content to be lesser (even misunderstood).

In short, the Kingdom is not an environment for self-sufficient adults.

To internalise and live the message:

What have you learned from the distant ones and their call? And is your community ready for welcome, for hospitality?

Or does it consider itself self-sufficient, and only poses as the great protagonist of alms-giving - turning others into objects of paternalism?

The Follower without citizenship

In the synodal journey, listening must take into account the sensus fidei, but it must not neglect all those "presentiments" embodied where we would not expect it: there may be a "sniff without citizenship", but it is no less effective. The Holy Spirit in his freedom knows no boundaries, nor does he allow himself to be limited by affiliations. If the parish is the home of everyone in the neighbourhood, not an exclusive club, I would recommend: leave doors and windows open, do not limit yourself to considering only those who attend or think like you - that will be 3, 4 or 5 per cent, no more. Allow everyone to enter... Allow yourself to go out and let yourself be questioned, let their questions be your questions, allow yourself to walk together: the Spirit will lead you, trust the Spirit. Don't be afraid to enter into dialogue and allow yourselves to be shocked by it: it is the dialogue of salvation.

Do not be disenchanted, be prepared for surprises. There is an episode in the book of Numbers (ch. 22) that tells of a donkey who will become a prophetess of God. The Jews are concluding the long journey that will lead them to the promised land. Their passage frightens King Balak of Moab, who relies on the powers of the magician Balaam to stop these people, hoping to avoid a war. The magician, in his believing way, asks God what to do. God tells him not to go along with the king, but he insists, so he gives in and mounts a donkey to fulfil the command he has received. But the donkey changes her path because she sees an angel with an unsheathed sword standing there to represent God's opposition. Balaam pulls her, beating her, without succeeding in getting her back on the path. Until the donkey starts talking, initiating a dialogue that will open the magician's eyes, turning his mission of curse and death into a mission of blessing and life.

This story teaches us to trust that the Spirit will always make his voice heard. Even a donkey can become the voice of God, opening our eyes and converting our wrong directions. If a donkey can do it, how much more so can a baptised person, a priest, a bishop, a pope. It is enough to rely on the Holy Spirit who uses all creatures to speak to us: he only asks us to clean our ears to hear well.

(Pope Francis, Speech 18 September 2021)