A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint Mark. Jesus appeared to the 11 and said to them, go into the entire world and proclaim the good news to all creation. The man who believes in it and accepts baptism will be saved. The man who refuses to believe in it will be condemned. Signs like these will accompany those who have professed their faith.
They will use my name to expel demons. They will speak entirely new languages. They will be able to handle serpents. They will be able to drink deadly poison without any harm. And the sick upon whom they lay their hands will recover.
Then, after speaking to them, the lord Jesus was taken up into heaven and took his seat at god's right hand. The 11 went forth and preached everywhere. The lord continued to work with them throughout and to confirm the message through the signs that went along with him and this is the gospel, the good news of the lord. In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit, amen. This is the feast of Saint Mark, martyr, but better known as the author of the second gospel as we have it in our canon.
But it's pretty well agreed that Saint Mark's gospel is the earliest of the four gospels. The earliest of the synoptic gospels. Now in spite of the incalculable, inexpressible influence that this writing of his has had down two something less than two thousand years. We know we know very little about Mark, and, actually, it's not very important. We know we know about him about he appears in the book of the acts.
We know he lived in Jerusalem. We know he had a mother in Jerusalem. We know he had a falling out with Saint Paul and Barnabas, but we know very little about him really as a man, his life, and all of that, how he came to write the gospel and all that. We know practically The one thing we have is his gospel that we have. And this is a good occasion just to call your mind to the fact that we do have four gospels.
And we have the epistles, and we have the book of revelation. And together, they constitute a very thin volume called the New Testament. And it's a good occasion to remind ourselves that since it's a book and since it's supposed to have such great worth, it might be well worth our time to read it once in a while. And I mean read it. I don't mean dabble in it.
I don't mean taking it up about 10 or 15 lines a day. You don't read anything seriously that way. One of the most important things about reading any kind of a document or a book is to get a glimpse of it as a whole. Otherwise, you can get anything you want out of the written word. Anything you want out of the written word.
That sounds like a crazy statement, but it's almost true. And you're dealing here with written word. As a matter of fact, you're not dealing here with the original at all. You're dealing with some translation, what some men think that the Greek says. That's what you're dealing with.
And the very fact that we get all these new translations show you how insecure we are in our translation. Remember, the translations we're using now for the confraternity are obsolete. They have been thrown out. The even the men who who were involved in producing tell us now, well, you know, it was a very hasty work that we're really embarrassed by. That's the written word, folks.
Now the church of Christ wasn't built on a book. Now very recently, I mean, just almost hours ago, I read a very serious article with some replies. Why are so many Catholics going? I don't say leaving the Catholic church, but they're ceasing to practice and going into fundamental one of the most outstanding, of course, lieutenant colonel North. The article I read was by a a man who, of course, is perfectly competent to speak.
His four years graduating out of Dartmouth. That is an as an undergraduate. He became a Catholic, a very fervent Catholic, I guess, and then he decided that the church was not answering his needs. So he joined up with some kind of a fundamentalist group too. By that by that word, I mean, they they make a great deal of the bible and reading the bible and sitting around in the evening with a in candlelight and discussing the whatever it is.
Because you see, when you pick this book up, you they say this is the word of god. It is not the word of god. That's an English translation of the Greek. The the only text which has the which has the infallibility of the of god behind it is the Greek. Now my point is what we read today shows you that the church existed and was vigorous and made converts and was strong and was expanding and went all over the whole Mediterranean Basin without a book.
This coming Sunday's gospel is going to be about the vine and the branches. We are told in today's reading how how to well, will be, we'll see, how the church of Jesus Christ is founded upon the apostles, not upon a book. Upon the apostles, living men who carried tradition, carried the carried the good news. When Paul circulated all around the Mediterranean Basin, he didn't have two or three volumes of the of the bible under his arms. When Saint Peter and Barnabas and Mark, when they roamed around, they didn't carry any books with them.
We've got to come is the we come back to this very basic question. Is there a god? Is Jesus Christ his son? Did Jesus Christ come on Earth? Did he found a church?
And if you answer yes to all of them, then you say, where is that church today? And the answer to the the question isn't does it satisfy my needs. The question is, where is Christ Church, and where is my obligation? First, to find it and then to be in it. I may not like what like what I find.
I bless the lord never promised we would. So the this the we are we are in a very basic situation. There is nothing can take the place of the four evangelists, letters of saint. These are an of well, you cannot speak of them in any way trying to appraise their worth. But the thing is, they are not the basis of the Catholic church, the church of Jesus Christ founded.
The basis is the living voice of the living Christ in his living body. And that is the vine on which we are the branches. And Christ said, if you're not on my vine, you're going to wither and die and die. The name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. Amen.