Our photo today captures the freedom, power and great energy of a horse galloping at full speed.

Thought on Sunday – January – 22/01/2012

Our reflectioin today is by Triona Doherty called ‘Something fishy’

Our First Reading today doesn’t tell us the whole story. In this, the tail-end of Jonah’s story, we see him respond immediately to God’s call and head off obediently to preach to the people of Nineveh. But that’s only half the story. The earlier chapters of the Book of Jonah saw him stubbornly refuse to do as God asked him, fleeing instead in the opposite direction. It takes a mighty storm, a near shipwreck, and a very close encounter with a big fish to make him see sense and do as he’s asked. And even then, as Jonah’s story draws to a close, we see him sulking outside Nineveh because he feels God should not have awarded the very forgiveness he himself has preached!He has certainly earned his title of reluctant prophet.

Not so the disciples in today’s Gospel. When Simon, Andrew, James, and John are called by Jesus, they leave their nets and their boats ‘at once’ to follow him. They even leave their families behind, such is their haste to follow Jesus. In the opening pages of the Gospel of Mark, everything happens ‘at once’ or immediately. Jesus’ collecting of disciples is unstoppable and the work of the kingdom too immediate to wait. There’s no time for dilly dallying.

It took some time and some convincing, and being swallowed whole by a fish, before Jonah was ready to fulfil God’s plan. The disciples, by contrast, are ready and willing to respond to Jesus’ call: ‘Follow me and I will make you fishers of people.’ The choice is ours.