Chapter Five is a chapter of healing. Firstly, Jesus heals a man with a demon. Then he heals a woman and Jairus’s daughter. When he tells them that the child is not dead – as they suspect – but sleeping, they laugh at him. But he says “Talitha cumi” which means “Little girl, I say to you, arise.”
Reading Mark in Advent is an 18-part podcast series that sees us upload a chapter of Mark’s Gospel each weekday of the season.
With a global pandemic sweeping the world and lockdowns and restrictions placed on our everyday living – not to mention patterns of worship and prayer – this is very much “the Word in Lockdown”.
But the Word of God is never locked down, isolated and contained. As Pope Francis says:
“The word of God is alive and active (Hebrews 4:12); it does not die, nor does it age, but it remains for ever (cf. 1 Peter 1:25). It stays young in the presence of all that passes away (cf. Matthew 25:35) and preserves those who put it into practice from inner aging.”
Chapter Seven sees Jesus tell the Pharisees and scribes that they have rejected the commandments of God to establish their own traditions. He explains...
Chapter 12 starts with Jesus speaking to the chief priests, scribes and elders in parables. He tells the Parable of the Tenants showing them...
For Chapter Fourteen, we have two podcasts to proclaim the Gospel. We learn, at the start of the chapter, that the chief priests and...