"But passing through the midst of them he went away."

This is an extremely beautiful homily:



Luke 4:16-30

And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up; and he went to the synagogue, as his custom was, on the sabbath day. And he stood up to read;
and there was given to him the book of the prophet Isaiah. He opened the book and found the place where it was written,
"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
and recovering of sight to the blind,
to set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord."

And he closed the book, and gave it back to the attendant, and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him.
And he began to say to them, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing."
And all spoke well of him, and wondered at the gracious words which proceeded out of his mouth; and they said, "Is not this Joseph's son?"
And he said to them, "Doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, `Physician, heal yourself; what we have heard you did at Caper'na-um, do here also in your own country.'"

And he said, "Truly, I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his own country.
But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Eli'jah, when the heaven was shut up three years and six months, when there came a great famine over all the land;
and Eli'jah was sent to none of them but only to Zar'ephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow.
And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Eli'sha; and none of them was cleansed, but only Na'aman the Syrian."

When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath.
And they rose up and put him out of the city, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their city was built, that they might throw him down headlong.
But passing through the midst of them he went away.

And Cardinal Schonborn reflects:
"Lord do not abandon us. Do not leave our countries. Do not leave the Church in Europe. We have been so enthusiastic about you throughout all the great ages of Christianity. But then we have become tired about your words, about your requirements, about what seemed to us too hard a request, too hard a call. We prefer the mainstream. We prefer the politically correct. We are tired of your Gospel...I ask you to pray that the Lord does not pass through the midst of us and go away."

He goes on to say that he see signs that the Lord has indeed not abandoned His Church in Europe.

I've long been interested in Cardinal Schonborn - the princely cardinal (he comes from an ancient and illustrious Central European noble family). He's also a famous student of Cardinal Ratzinger.

After watching his videos on science, Darwinism, Creation, I'm now a big fan!