CONVERSION OF SAINT PAUL JANUARY 25

 HOMILY FOR 25 JANUARY 2023 WEDNESDAY- FEAST OF THE CONVERSION OF ST. PAUL (REPLACING WEDNESDAY OF 3RD WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME I)

Acts 22: 3-16    or    Acts 9: 1-22;         Psalm 117: 1bc, 2;         Mark 16: 15-18

DOES YOUR PRESENCE INVOKE THE PRESENCE OF GOD!

I pray for you: May you continue to proclaim that Jesus is Lord of your life by the way you live your life, particularly in the loving service of others. AMEN

Today is the octave of Prayer for Christian Unity. Ask yourself, how much (in terms of effort) you have contributed to the Unity of Christians. What and what have you done? God is watching us my dear brother, my dear sister. Help the Church of God on earth to grow. Preach peace and unity. Preach peace and love and justice. Now to the homily of today. 

I know individuals who make conversations and actions change when they walk into a room.  Before they enter the room, the conversion may be a bit vulgar, rude and dirty, or dirty jokes and foul language may be the talk. Once the believer walks into the room, the conversation is immediately cleaned up. The believer does not have to say anything, but the other persons in the room know for what the believer stands and they respect the believer and do not want to speak like they were speaking before the believer enters the room. It is not out of fear of what the believer will say or do, it is because the people understand what the believer believes and they honor the believer and the convictions of the believers. We should all have such convictions and be able to sway the actions and words of others to more positive position, simply by our presence which proclaims the presence of the Lord Jesus. 

Both of the two options for the First Reading recount the story of the conversion of Saint Paul. What strikes me about the reading(s) from the Acts of the Apostles is the determination of Paul. As a strict Jew, a Pharisee and a follower of Gamaliel (Gamaliel was a famous rabbi), Saul had been brought up with the concept of being a faithful believer in the one God. Saul was so convinced of his ways that he mounted a crusade to put an end to *”the people of the Way.* People of the way is name given to the group of Jews who claimed that Jesus Christ was divine and the Son of God and that He saved people through His death and resurrection. In other words, Christians were referred to as People of the way then, before they are later called Christians. It was while he was on this crusade to extinguish the early Christians in Damascus that he was enlightened; he saw the light. It was blinding. And he heard the voice of Jesus saying: Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me? Saul was not only fighting against a group of people who followed Jesus, but Jesus Himself. This was the start of Pauls conversion. In Acts 22: 3-16, Paul tells this story of his own conversion while he, himself, is on trial for being a Christian. He is still very determined, but now his determination is in defense of the Christian Way. There is no doubt that he is now preaching a different Gospel than he has before his conversion. He is willing to face imprisonment, suffering, and even death in order to help spread the Word and proclaim the Good News to all creation. His life speaks of his dedication to being an apostle, one who is sent, and an evangelist, Good News announcer. There is so much evidence that Paul is a converted man, a man of the Way, the early name for Christianity.

The Gospel comes from the end of the Gospel according to Mark, after the resurrection, when Jesus Christ commissioned His apostles to go out to all the world and proclaim the Good News to all creation.

Dear Sisters and Brothers, ask yourself this question: If I am put on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict me for being a Christian? Can my prosecutors find enough evidence that I am a Christian? And I think that is a valid question for each of us today. For Paul, there was more than enough evidence to convict him of being a Christian. Not only did he call himself a follower of Jesus Christ, he preached the Good News, suffered persecution, and lived a life that proclaimed that Jesus Christ is Lord. Is there enough evidence in my life to be used to show that I am a Christian? It is easy to say, I am Christian when there is nothing at risk.  For some people it is fashionable to say they are a Christian, a church goer. Speaking such words, however, is not enough evidence. There should be some hard evidence, some actions which prove that one is a follower of Jesus Christ. Jesus said, They will know you are My follower if you love one another as I have loved you (John 13: 35). My life should be marked by love, punctuated by acts of service.  I also must be able to stand up for what I believe and not be ashamed of my lifestyle. People must be able to see who my Master and Lord is by the way I live my life.  

All of us who call ourselves Christian must continually go through conversion, as Paul did. We need to keep looking at our lives and see where our dedication is. Are we only caught up in the rituals and external trappings of being a believer, or have we gone the further step and centered our lives on the person of Jesus Christ? Are we willing to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ in our life style, by living lives that proclaim the love and peace, justice and mercy of Our Lord Jesus Christ; and unity for all people? Do our actions reflect our Master so that people can say to us, I know who your Master is, it is Jesus Christ. Hopefully none of us will ever have to go on trial for being Christians, but if we do, let us be willing to have left enough evidence to convict us of being a disciple of Jesus, the Christ, and our Lord. Jesus Christ is my Master. Christianity is my DNA. Stand up for Jesus Christ. Love and cherish the brothers and Sisters of Jesus Christ. It shall be well with you. Amen.

Dearly beloved in Christ Jesus, do we ever, in counter distinction to Paul, abandon the Crucified One to gain the favor of those who persecute Him? In the time of Paul, as in our own, the Gospel is counter cultural. The demands of conversion are not always well received by those who are committed to doing evil. If they sought to kill the Righteous One because He was obnoxious to them, they will certainly seek to silence those who teach the truth in His name. When they are not able to embarrass us into silence by ridiculing the tenants of our faith, they may drag us into courts or, as in some places in the world today, put us to death. In 1990 Saint Pope John Paul II invited us to reignite our dedication to redemptive living: The mission of Christ the Redeemer, which is entrusted to the Church, is still very far from completion. As the second Millennium after the coming of Christ Jesus draws to an end, an overview of the human race shows that this mission is still only beginning and that we must commit ourselves wholeheartedly to its service. It is the Spirit who impels us to proclaim the great works of God (Redemptoris Missio, No. 90). 

The core of the conversion of Paul was this reversal of values, by placing Jesus at the centre of his faith. Yhe story of Paul is the story of a sinner made saint. Thus a blasphemer and a persecutor was made an apostle, and chosen as one of the principal instruments of God in the conversion of the world. When he later declared that the gospel preached by me is not something I received from other people it was something of an exaggeration, in a polemic context. He meant that none of the original disciples of Jesus Christ had taught Paul his special insight about Christ as Saviour of mankind. He had never studied from other Christians in the way that Rabbis had taught him the Mosaic Law.

The encounter with Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus provided the dynamism for his mission to the Gentiles. Christ was the new Adam, the embodiment of authentic humanity. The Mosaic Law was no longer a barrier to the salvation of Gentiles. They could be saved without first becoming Jews. His conversion was for the Gentiles, When he who had set me apart from my mothers womb, and had called me through his grace, was pleased to reveal his son to me, in order that I might preach him among the nations.

Paul encourages Christians to carry on the redemptive mission of Jesus with full confidence in the power of His love, and reminds us all that true love, Christian love, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Through the example of Paul we must come to hold on to the truth that this Love never ends (1 Cor 13:7-8).

MEDITATION What evidence is there in my life which honestly could be used to convict me of being a Christian? Am I willing to undergo whatever trials might be ahead of me as a sign of my conversion of heart to Jesus?  How can I give witness to my dedication to the cause of the Lord Jesus? What can I do to help others who are faced with decision about giving their lives to the Lord Jesus, even at the cost of rejection and persecution?

PRAYER Lord God, may our lives give witness to our belief in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Master, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.  .  Amen.

O DIVINE WORD WHO TOOK FLESH FOR HUMAN SAKE, REDEEM US IN OUR SITUATIONS

© Rev. Fr. Utazi Prince Marie Benignus