Sermon/Theophilus

Today is the beginning of "Ordinary Time" in the Church. There is something funny about that. The Old Testament reading is a long review of the history of Israel and reads like  history of Man  with war, slavery, abuse and resilient recovery. The average guy stumbles through his life in the Old Testament as the Sport of Kings.

The Gospel is the opening of Luke's letter to the "most excellent Theophilus" (Lover of God). After explaining that he is writing down the results of his research into the life of Christ, Luke writes of Christ's initial entry into his public life (presumably after his mother pushes him into a miracle at the marriage at Cana.) This is what Luke writes after Christ in the synagogue opens a scroll of the writings of the prophet Isaiah:

He unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written:
The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me
to bring glad tidings to the poor.He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives
and recovery of sight to the blind,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.
Rolling up the scroll, he handed it back to the attendant and sat down,
and the eyes of all in the synagogue looked intently at him.
He said to them,
"Today this Scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing."

Laconic. The world's shortest sermon. And hardly the beginning of "Ordinary Times."