Meditations On The Gospel Of Luke For The FamilySample

"MEDITATION 4: Presentation in the Temple"

This is the last of the events related to the birth of Jesus. After this episode, Joseph, Mary and Jesus will settle in Nazareth, and we will not hear anything about them until Jesus is twelve years old and they return again to the Temple for the feast of Passover. In today’s story, Luke underlines two basic ideas that are present throughout his Gospel.

Although the book has in mind Greeks and Romans, (neither of whom felt too much sympathy toward the Jews), and even if he does not present Jesus as a new Moses, the giver of the new Law, Luke insists on the Jewish roots, background and condition of Jesus. Just after the prescribed circumcision, in just three verses, he tells us that all the rites were performed “according to the Law.” The Law will be mentioned twice more in this passage. We are also told that “each year his [Jesus’] parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover” (2:41). Later on, just as Matthew did, Luke will include Jesus’ genealogy (3:23- 38).

The other trait is the importance of humble people, those who “do not count at all.” We saw that in the moment of Jesus’ birth it was the shepherds, marginal characters, who were invited by the angels to go and see the newborn “Messiah and Lord” (2:8-20). The first time he preaches in the synagogue of Nazareth, Jesus proclaims his mission: he has been sent “to bring good tidings to the poor” (4:18), and we must remember that “the poor” are not only the needy, but those who recognize their humble condition before God. Simeon is not a priest, nor are we told that he had any special role in the Temple. He was there, moved by the Spirit, in the hope of seeing the Messiah of the Lord. What he actually sees is the child of a poor couple. Even so, he feels that the promise has been fulfilled and he proclaims his gratitude for having seen God’s salvation for all people, the “light for the revelation to the Gentiles.”

In his words we hear the echo of John’s preface: the Word was “the light of the human race” who had come to his own people. As for Anna, she does not play any official role the Temple either. She is, as it were, a “nobody,” but she also thanks God for something that perhaps she did no fully understand, good news for those who “were awaiting the redemption of Jerusalem.”

Rev. Fr. Mariano Perrón, Roman Catholic priest, Archdiocese of Madrid, Spain