Beware of the message of less

In his Introduction to the Gospel of John, Don Schwager writes “Who is Jesus of Nazareth? This is the fundamental question which the Gospel of John poses for us”. The texts today from the Roman CatholicLectionary take us to the beginning of this spiritual gospel where John proclaims, as noted by Luis Rodriguez, S.J. of Creighton University, that the Word ”became flesh and (literally) pitched his tent among us” (John 1:14). The First Letter of John is from a time around 100 AD, in the city of Ephesus, a Greek-speaking center of commerce and culture. Greek culture was not open to the idea that God, the Word, should become flesh and that we would be able to experience the Presence of God in human form. Some forms of anti-Christ heresies involve presenting Jesus a very good moral human who preached love. When we limit our relationship with Jesus to this level, today, we undervalue the Love which is in the gift of Son by Father to humanity. We limit our communion to the affiliation we might have with human leaders. The clay feet of human leaders always limit our expectations for what good might result. Intimate relationship with the Divine through Jesus who acquires clay feet as He pitches His tent among us opens the transcendent possibilities of fulfillment of the joy which is the mission of Jesus expressed by the Evangelist John that we may all be one (John 17:20-26).