Magnificat - Praying with Saint Mark’s Gospel: Daily Reflections on the Gospel of Saint Mark

Foreword

Father Peter John Cameron, o.p.

T wo of the most mystifying verses in all of the New Testament are found in the Gospel of Mark: Now a young man followed him [Jesus] wearing nothing but a linen cloth about his body. They seized him, but he left the cloth behind and ran off naked" (Mk 14: 51-52). Many have endeavored to "uncover" the mystery of this unclothed mans identity. But the only satisfying solution is one that answers a more nagging question: Why is this mans story part of the Gospel of Mark in the first place? If this episode has been included, it must be because there is something crucial in it for our life of faith. Explaining who the young man is means revealing why we need to know about him.

The rich young man?

As soon as we hear the expression "a young man," we probably think of the Gospel story of the Rich Young Man. In fact, in the Gospel of Matthew, this fellow is "young"; in the Gospel of Mark he is "rich"; and in the Gospel of Luke he is a "ruler." But we commonly blend these attributes to speak of the Rich Young Man. Marks version of the encounter of the Rich Young Man with Jesus occurs in Mk 10: 17-22. The man "ran up, knelt down before [Jesus], and asked him, Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?'" When the Lord indicates the commandments, the man assures Jesus that he has observed them since his youth. Then we read this: Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said to him, You are lacking in one thing. Go, sell what you have, and give to [the] poor and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me. At that statement his face fell, and he went away sad, for he had many possessions."

Venerable Thomas a Kempis in The Imitation of Christ sums up the dilemma of the Rich Young Man in all of us: "If you seek yourself, you will find yourself to your own ruin. For the man who does not seek Jesus does himself much greater harm than the whole world and all his enemies could ever do." So was this the end of the Rich Young Man?

The look that loves

As shocked and devastated as the Rich Young Man was at Christs response, it is hard to believe that afterwards he simply returned to "business as usual." Could you? Even though he found the Lords counsel outrageous, the way that Jesus looked at him prevented the Rich Young Man from dismissing his words: Jesus, looking at him, loved him." When the Son of God turned his eyes on the man with such a loving gaze, he looked past all the mans self-importance, his preconceptions, his resistance, his materialism, his ambition, his "virtue." Christs look of love pierces our fantasies, our self-sufficiency our disordered priorities, our plans. It penetrates to our heart and lays bare our deepest, truest longings.

Before temporal things are possessed," writes Saint Thomas Aquinas, "they are highly regarded and thought satisfying; but after they are possessed, they are found to be neither so great as thought nor sufficient to satisfy our desires, and so our desires are not satisfied but move on to something else." When Jesus looks at the Rich Young Man with love, the youths desires move on to Something Else.

The repentant Rich Young Man

Some of the Fathers of the Church hold the opinion that the naked man in the Garden of Gethsemane is the repentant Rich Young Man. Repentance, after all, is one of the most prevailing themes in the Gospel of Mark. John the Baptist proclaims "a baptism of repentance" (Mk 1: 4). Christ begins his earthly ministry with the words, This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel" (Mk 1: 15). Jesus proclaims: I did not come to call the righteous but sinners" (Mk 2: 17). The newly commissioned apostles "went off and preached repentance" (Mk 6: 12).

But what moves us to repent? Repentance is not directed to some code of conduct. After all, as Pope Benedict XVI teaches, "Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice... but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction" (Deus Caritas Est 1). Repentance is always to a person... a person who looks at us with a love that awakens priceless truth and meaning we had neglected. Repentance is a change in what we set our heart on. Repentance is surrender to the personal transformation that God both desires for us and personally brings about in us.

Maybe the Lords transfixing look of love changed the way that the Rich Young Man listened. Maybe it helped him remember what Jesus had said shortly before they met: "Amen, I say to you, whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child will not enter it" (Mk 10: 15). Maybe then he recognized how much childlike abandonment was the "one thing lacking" in him. Maybe the Rich Young Man continued to follow Christ at a distance and took it to heart when he heard the Lord declare, "The Son of Man... [came] to give his life as a ransom for many" (Mk 10: 45). Maybe the Rich Young Man was stunned at the way blind Bartimaeus "threw aside his cloak" his sole possession in the world (see Ex 22: 25-26) when Jesus Christ called him. Maybe, too, the sight of so many spreading their cloaks on the road before Jesus (Mk 11: 8) aroused a yearning to cultivate such detachment and munificence himself. Most of all, maybe observing the offering made by the poor widow in the temple was for him the clincher, since she gave "from her poverty,... all she had, her whole livelihood" (Mk 12: 44). Maybe the poor old widow inspired the Rich Young Man to sell all he had and give it to the poor, keeping only a linen cloth to wear for clothes.

The Gethsemane grace

In his newly acquired poverty, the Rich Young Man kept on following Jesus, even into the Garden of Gethsemane. The panic incited by the "crowd with swords and clubs" (Mk 14: 43) caused him to flee, leaving behind the last thing he owned. But with that divesting came a great grace, for now the Rich Young Man was truly, totally poor... truly, totally free. Moments before the rabble arrived, perhaps he overheard the prayer of Jesus in his agony: "Abba, Father... Not what I will but what you will" (Mk 14: 36). That is, he heard Jesus himself accept the kingdom of God like a child. And that was all the Rich Young Man needed to be able to do the same.

When the women go to Christs tomb very early on Easter, notice that it is not an angel they encounter (Mk 16: 1-8). There in the tomb, sitting on the right side, is "a young man," dressed in a white robe dressed like the transfigured Christ (see Mk 9: 2-3) who speaks to them: "You seek Jesus of Nazareth, the crucified. He has been raised." Because the repentant Rich Young Man has lived the whole of his life in Christs look of love, he has become completely transformed and clothed with Christ... so much so that he is sent to evangelize others. "The beginning of the gospel of Jesus" (Mk 1: 1) for us is our obedience to that transfiguring look of love modeled by the most mysterious man in Mark.

INTRODUCTION
The Suffering and Glory
of the Messiah

Mary Healy

They saw the man who had been possessed by the legion, sitting there clothed and in his right mind. And they were afraid... Jesus told him, "Go home to your family and announce to them all that the Lord in his mercy has done for you." So he went away and began to proclaim in the Decapolis what Jesus had done for him; and all were amazed .
(Mk 5: 15, 19-20; authors translation)

T he whole of Marks Gospel is encapsulated in this unlikely scene. Jesus has just delivered the Gerasene demoniac, a man whose pitiable condition Mark describes in graphic detail. The man lived among the tombs, captive to evil, alienated from human society and consumed by self-hatred and despair. It is an image of fallen humanity, wounded and disfigured by the consequences of sin. But this wretched man has been transfigured by his encounter with Jesus, who with a word expels the evil spirits that had held him in bondage. The man is now "clothed," his human dignity restored, and his guilt and shame taken away. He is "in his right mind," able to clearly perceive the truth about himself and about the Lord who delivers him. The people of the town, having witnessed this stunning transformation, are seized with fear the typical biblical reaction to a theophany.