Wednesday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time
(I Samuel
3:1-10.19-20; Mark 1:29-39)
One of Flannery
O’Connor’s last short story “Revelation” describes the conversion of a bigot. Mrs. Turpin, a baptized Christian, has a
vision of people, whom she disdains, entering heaven. Then she realizes that she has been called to
join them. But first she must repent of
her prejudices. Like the first reading
says of its epoch in ancient Israel, such revelation is rare.
Revelations
are rare when people do not orient themselves to God. They attend to the world around them as if
what they see and hear is all that is.
Eli, the old priest, still has an inkling of what true revelation
consists. He tells the boy Samuel to act
on his perception of a voice calling him.
Jesus in today’s gospel heeds an inner voice calling him. He is not to settle in any town as the local shaman. Rather his mission is to preach the Kingdom
of God in different places.
