‘He sent me to bring the Good News to the poor’
We always pay special attention to the inaugural address of a leader outlining, as it usually does, the vision of the new regime. Today we listen with special attention as Jesus delivers his first sermon in the synagogue in Capernaum. It is His ‘mission statement’ and His mission will be different. He will have a special concern and care for the last, the least and the lost. During His public ministry, by day, by night, at waters’ edge, on mountaintop, at town pool, at village well He will put flesh on the words of that first sermon. The new wine of Cana will flow through every gesture and encounter. He will touch the untouchable. He will invite the outsider in. He will welcome the sinner home. He will in short, proclaim the equal dignity of all God’s children. G.K. Chesterton, poet, writer and convert to Catholicism, proposed a simple, everyday image to explain the heart of Jesus’ mission: ‘People are equal in the same way that pennies are equal. Some are bright; others are dull; some are worn smooth; others are sharp and fresh. But all are equal in value, because each penny bears the image of the sovereign, each person bears the image of the King of Kings’.