In contemporary Western society many people are simply ignorant of the message of Christianity: they might have a few vague ideas about what it involves, but not the kind of knowledge that would be needed in order to recognise Christ and to make a commitment to living a Christian life.
Those of us, however, who have been educated in the Faith, who hear a sermon at Mass every Sunday (or perhaps even more frequently), have no such excuse: indeed, we can often run the risk of being like the Pharisees in today's Gospel. They knew the Scriptures inside out, and were experts in the finer details of the law: if anyone was going to see in Jesus the fulfilment of the prophecies about the Messiah it should have been them. Instead, though, they are so confident in their own interpretation of the Scriptures that they simply reject all contrary evidence and see it simply as a threat: 'this crowd, who do not know the Law, are accursed,' they say (John 7:49). And yet it is members of 'this crowd', not the Pharisees, who recognise him, saying, 'This is the Christ.' (John 7:41)So also we must not allow our faith to become a dry collection of facts and practices, deprived of any actual relationship with Jesus, the Christ. How is this to be done, though? In a sense, this is the wrong question: it's not something to be done, but rather something we must allow to happen in us - the flourishing of the life of grace which was given to us in our Baptism. In place of the pride of the Pharisees, we must seek to imitate the humility of Christ who, as the prophet Jeremiah foretold, went to his death 'like a gentle lamb led to the slaughter' (Jeremiah 11:19). In that way, not only will we ourselves be drawn closer to Jesus, but our preaching of his good news to our society will be more effective, for it will not be our work, but the work of his Spirit dwelling in us.
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