Gospel Reflection on Mk 8:11-13

February 17, 2025

The Pharisees came forward and began to argue with Jesus, seeking from him a sign from heaven to test him. He sighed from the depth of his spirit and said, “Why does this generation seek a sign? Amen, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation.”

Then he left them, got into the boat again, and went off to the other shore.

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Jesus is replied to that question and eventually his sort of surrender kind of should make us wonder because everything he's done has been signs.

Signs are all around him all the time except they couldn't see them.

And so eventually he comes to the end and all they can do is sigh and say, I can't do anymore. Because the sign is in us, it's around us.

All around us are the signs of God's love, are the signs of God's desire to be known,

of God's desire for us to engage with God and bring in creation to its fullness.

All those signs are around us if we could only see.

Bede Griffiths, a Benedictine monk that we'll be talking a little bit about after this, he said "it's really interesting -he says- you ask a Christian 'where is God?' And they point like this -upward. He said, you ask a Hindu 'where is God?' and they go like this -inward, instinctively." Isn't that interesting? And when you think about signs, we're actually at something outside of us, something beyond us, something over there, as if God is apart from us. But he's it's really interesting. You ask a Christian that question 'where is God?' and they point up. You ask a Hindu 'where is God?' They point in. I think we can learn from the Hindus and say 'no. God is in here.'

God is present here. I don't need a sign. The sign of God's love is inside of me. It's dwelling inside of me, urging me to be part of this ongoing transformation of creation. And and maybe if we could do that, then maybe Jesus wouldn't sigh over us so much.

There there is hope for these people. They don't need signs anymore.

Find more reflections here:

Weekdays Reflections 2022/25