Tenth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Year B

Tenth Ordinary Sunday

Images

Family showing concerns

Points to note

 

The passage this Sunday is formed like a sandwich with the opening and final paragraphs referring to Jesus’ family while the ‘meat’ part are the paragraphs about the exchange between Jesus and the scribes. It is pretty difficult to discuss this and you may wish to drop this middle part and focus on the two end passages.

Neither are the other two passages are easy.  Even though it deals with the theme of the family, it challenges the conventional relationship with family members if you are not too careful.  So it may be safer to discuss the concerns that family members have for each other. 

You may need to have answers ready for questions from older children in the final passage as they are bound to feel puzzled if they had listened well to the reading.

Liturgy

Acclamation

Alleluia!  Alleluia!

If anyone loves me he will keep my word,

and my Father will love him, 

and we shall come to him.

Alleluia!

 

 

Gospel

Explain that Jesus is going around Galilee peaching and healing people but there were people who didn’t like what he was teaching.

A Reading from the Holy Gospel according to St Mark

(Mk3: 20-35)

Jesus went home with his disciples, and such a crowd collected that they could not even have a meal. When his relatives heard of this, they set out to take charge of him, convinced he was out of his mind.

The scribes who had come down from Jerusalem were saying, ‘Beelzebul is in him’ and, ‘It is through the prince of devils that he casts devils out.’ So he called them to him and spoke to them in parables, ‘How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot last. And if a household is divided against itself, that household can never stand. Now if Satan has rebelled against himself and is divided, he cannot stand either – it is the end of him. But no one can make his way into a strong man’s house and burgle his property unless he has tied up the strong man first. Only then can he burgle his house.

‘I tell you solemnly, all men’s sins will be forgiven, and all their blasphemies; but let anyone blaspheme against the Holy Spirit and he will never have forgiveness: he is guilty of an eternal sin.’ This was because they were saying, ‘An unclean spirit is in him.’

His mother and brothers now arrived and, standing outside, sent in a message asking for him. A crowd was sitting round him at the time the message was passed to him, ‘Your mother and brothers and sisters are outside asking for you.’ He replied, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking round at those sitting in a circle about him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my brother and sister and mother.’

This is the Gospel of the Lord

Discussion

Get the children to imagine the scene for the first reading: a busy place, lots of people, Jesus’ home is crowded with people that they can’t even have dinner.  

Imagine if that happened in your house that your brother/sister had so many friends over in the house that the family can’t even have dinner.  What would mom and dad do? Explore all the possibilities: no one can watch TV, eat, talk, etc.  Discuss whether people in the house would be happy with the situation.

What would they then do?  Discuss how they would probably had tried to chase everyone out and then tried to make sure it doesn’t happen again by taking him to the doctor.  

Explain that in this story, Jesus’ family also was concerned about Jesus’ wellbeing.  They mistakenly thought that what Jesus was doing was not right.  Emphasise that in the end they realised their error and were his greatest supporters.

You may want to point out that Jesus’ family thought he was out of his mind and take the opportunity to explain that not all illnesses are physical with a visible symptom like a cold or fever.  Some illnesses are not so visible like mental illness.  Manage the reaction as mental illness in most parts of the world still carries a stigma.  Explain that most mental illnesses are caused by an emotional trauma and that most such illnesses can be treated with a lot of love and support from their families.  Jesus’ family showed that love by hoping to bring him to a doctor promptly.

For older children

Explain that Jesus’s statement about his family in the final paragraph was not a repudiation of his family but was instead a widening of his family.  Imagine the family of the parish priest: his family is not just his mom & dad and his siblings & cousins but also the people he has to care for in the parish. But within that family he has a smaller circle of people who are helping him minister to the souls in the parish. In a way, they form the closer family circle who shares in his ministry much like how Jesus described those who do the work of God as his family.