Jesus, today in the Gospel, reprimands his contemporaries for their lack of faith. The problem isn’t that they seek a sign, but their motive and lack of understanding of that sign. They were gathering because they wanted a show—more flashy “magic” and excitement. Jesus tells them they will have no sign but that of Jonah.
Most of us are familiar with the story of Jonah and the whale. Here Jesus brings about several parallels to the behavior of those in His lifetime. Jonah believed the people of Ninevah to irredeemable. So much so that he ran from God and tried to go his own way. Instead, the whale swallowed him and, after three days, spat him out on the shore near Ninevah. Jonah then went into the city, preaching repentance. The people of Ninevah repented, and God saved them all.
Jesus is God Himself. Here the Incarnation stood before the people telling them that He too would spend three days in the earth, and come forth as a sign. He also, like Jonah, was preaching the message of repentance from their sins. God has given us the gift of being raised with Christ to freedom from sin. Like Ninevah, if we listen to the Gospel and repent of our sins, we will be saved.
Saint Paul reminds us in the letter to the Galatians that we are no longer slaves; we are children of God. That freedom in Christ does not mean freedom to whatever we want, but rather the freedom to do what we ought. He encourages us to stand firm and never to submit ourselves to the yoke of slavery again. How often we fail at that advice, falling right back into the same sins over and over again.
The key is to remember that God’s presence is still here among us. Jesus is here in the Eucharist, in the Sacraments of the Church, to continually call us again to repentance. In Him, we find freedom from our sins and receive the sacramental and actual grace necessary to be free from sin. Remember that every time you walk forward to receive Him in the Eucharist. There is something greater than Jonah here, my Lord, and my God.
A homily for Monday of the Twenty-eighth Week in Ordinary Time: October 12th, 2020