The eyes of faith

Two days ago, when I went out with father Carl to have lunch, I saw a series of beautiful pictures in the shop window. These pictures are made from small stones found on the coast. The artist picked them up and then put them together into frames, to make them become many beautiful masterpieces.
Looking at this made me reflect: for us, these little stones are of no value, but the eyes of the artist recognize their beauty and make them into wonderful works. Here we see the difference between our eyes and the artist's eyes. They discover the beauty hidden in ordinary things, while we cannot recognize it.

This makes us understand the story of the Gospel today: Jesus came back to his homeland, but his compatriots did not recognize him as the Son of God, the Saviour, because they are prejudiced about his identity. They said: “Who is He but the carpenter’s son, the son of Mary and the brother of James and Joseph and Judas and Simon?" (Mc 6,4). So, they took offense at him. Jesus himself was astounded at their unbelief.

They see Jesus only as an ordinary man, not the Son of God, because they lack faith in Him.

So, dear brothers and sisters, to recognize Jesus as God and Saviour, we must have faith. Our eyes of faith help us recognize who Jesus is. Indeed, Jesus is a normal man of  human origin in Nazareth, a man of history, not a myth. But in this man, he is also the Son of God, the true God from God who comes to save us.

Now, in other form, he is also present among us, for example through the Eucharist. With our human eyes, we do not recognize him, but with the eyes of faith, we recognize who is Jesus. We can be like the artist who can see the small stones on the coast and make them become the beautiful work of art.

Therefore, in this mass, we pray God strengthens our faith, and opens our eyes so that we may believe in Jesus and always recognize him present in our midst.  Amen!