Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Navarre Bible Commentary:
Wednesday, 7th Week in Ordinary Time

Mark 9:38-40

Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (RSVCE)

Another Exorcist

38 John said to him, “Teacher, we saw a man casting out demons in your name,[a] and we forbade him, because he was not following us.” 39 But Jesus said, “Do not forbid him; for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon after to speak evil of me. 40 For he that is not against us is for us.

Footnotes:

  1. Mark 9:38 Other ancient authorities add who does not follow us
Cited in the Catechism:  In promulgating the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Blessed John Paul II explained that the Catechism "is a statement of the Church's faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church's Magisterium."  He went on to "declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion" (Fidei Depositum). Passages from this Gospel reading are not cited in the Catechism.
Commentary
38-40. Our Lord warns the Apostles, and through them all Christians, against exclusivism in the apostolate – the notion that "good is not good unless I am the one who does it." We must assimilate this teaching of Christ's: good is good, even if it is not I who do it. Cf. note on Luke 9:49-50.
Note on Luke 9:49-50:49-50. Our Lord corrects the exclusivist and intolerant attitude of the Apostles. St. Paul later learned this lesson, as we can see from what he wrote during his imprisonment in Rome: "Some indeed preach Christ from envy and rivalry, but others from good will [...]. What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed; and in that I rejoice" (Philippians 1:15, 18). "Rejoice, when you see others working in good apostolic activities. And ask God to grant them abundant grace and that they may respond to that grace. Then, you, on your way: convince yourself that it's the only way for you" (St. J. Escriva, The Way, 965).]

Source: The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries. Biblical text from the Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and by Scepter Publishers in the United States. We encourage readers to purchase The Navarre Bible for personal study. See Scepter Publishers for details.

"Ignorance of Scripture is ignorance of Christ." St Jerome

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