The Gospel for today joins the opening sentence of the Gospel of Luke and skipping over the Infancy Narratives plunges us into the programmatic homily of Jesus at his home town of Nazareth. Luke tells Theophilus of his "orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among us" (Lk 1: 1) and in his homily Jesus tells the congregation "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing" (Lk 4: 21). When we listen to this in the light not only of the gospel but also of the companion volume the Acts of the Apostles we realise that the Gospel is not just a part of history but is being fulfilled in our time and place. We, along with Theophilus, belong to a generation who has not seen the Lord in person yet we believe. We also are brought to believe that the same Jesus, now risen, is active with, in and through us. the Gospel is alive and the power of the Spirit enables the followers of Jesus to continue his mission and do as the first disciples of Jesus did. This means that despite all of the challenges of our time we, too, can be a Peter or a Paul of today.
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