The Gospel of Mark and St Expectus?

Thom and Jack,
Good morning, I love you
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MLK day. I have my experiences connected to Rev. King. TV news and newsreel. I have personal memories of the Montgomery bus strike plus many friends who were in the city at the time. I have personal memories of the Selma Bridge march plus my own walk across it many years later and the ‘nigger’ sign over the restroom at the train station there. I have personal memories of the ‘Dream Speech’ and multiple repeat memories because of people who are much closer to the King story. I have personal, formative memories of the assassination, April 4, 1968: memories that I play over and over for my own edification. 1968 is, I know, twenty years before your time, ancient history. But that year – from the novitiate: King gets killed, Robert Kennedy gets killed, and the Chicago Convention runs wild – if that year is formative for me, there has to be some genetichormonal dump into your DNA as well as the few effects I’ve had on you qua parenting. Think of the conversations we’re missing, the opportunity costs…. Ora pro nobis.

Yesterday, Sunday, our celebrant was Msgr. Shreck. No joke. A professor from the seminary in Columbus filling in for his colleague and our pastor who’s in the holy land. I went to his discussion of Discipleship in the Gospel of Mark. Being the shortest Gospel it’s one I’ve read from cover to cover more than a few times. After listening to Msgr., I wondered if I’d really read Mark. I also wondered if I’d simply forgotten everything I’d been taught, every homily I’d heard, everything I’d read, every insight I might have had along the way.

Or, is it just a matter that we learn something new every day? Except, what Msgr. said was Mark 101 – as I discovered when I perused the commentaries I have on the Gospel. Or, maybe, in this week the Church dedicates to prayer for vocations, it was a renewed insight meant for me to use – for myself? For y’all? For my students? For someones else?

In the era of Mark’s writing, it was the responsibility for an individual who wanted to pursue ‘a career’ to seek and find his Master and hope that the Master agreed to take him on as an apprentice. But, Mark makes it clear that Jesus turned that practice on its head, 180 degrees. Jesus called the disciples He wanted. He called – and they followed! He picked His own disciples. He chose the Apostles.

Jesus making the choice, God making the call, continues to be, was forever it seems, the case today. You were Baptized. You were called by God, Father-Son-Spirit. You have been chosen. Not forced into Catholicism by your parents but You have been called by Jesus to follow Him. The Holy Spirit is indelibly marked on your soul. Confirmed by you and the Bishop. Renewed and reinforced by Reconciliation and Eucharist. You are called now and forever. Vocation is a formative process, evolving process – what you are called to do to fulfill who you are, how you may best serve God, may change as you become a better Catholic.

Msgr. asked us to ponder why did Mark make the disciples/Apostles out to be so slow on the uptake? Why did he make the point that they all abandoned Jesus in the Garden? Not to mention the Peter story. Late first century the persecution of Christians reached a pinnacle of ferocity. We had many martyrs and saintly heroes of the faith. We also had more than a few people who folded under the pressures of persecution. Mark made it clear for them – for you – that even those who rejected Jesus, there is always the opportunity for reconciliation. Think Apostles, think Peter. You are constantly being called to follow Jesus. Your ‘no’ today can become a ‘Yes!’ anytime.

Last night, after the Jets’ win, I reread Mark with a different eye, a renewed hope in my heart.

Then I discovered that there is a St Expectus! Or, like St. Christopher, Expectus is totally a creation of our own needs.


St Epeditus


At one time there was much talk of a Saint Expeditus, and some good people were led to believe that, when there was need of haste, petitioning Saint Expeditus was likely to meet with prompt settlement.



It is more than doubtful whether the saint ever existed.

There is a story which pretends to explain the origin of this "devotion" by an incident of modern date. A packing case, we are told, containing a body of a saint from the catacombs, was sent to a community of nuns in Paris. The date of its dispatch was indicated by the use of the word "spedito", but the recipients mistook this for the name of the martyr and set to work with great energy to propagate his cult. From these simple beginnings, it is asserted, a devotion to St. Expeditus spread rapidly through many Catholic countries.



As far back as 1781 this supposed martyr, St. Expeditus, was chosen patron of the town of Acireale in Sicily, and pictures of him were in existence in Germany in the eighteenth century which plainly depicted him as a saint to be invoked against procrastination.



I love you,
Dad
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