NOTES for Mar 3:13-35
One of the greatest saints of our time, Therese of Lisieux, began writing her autobiographical notes, "Story of a Soul," by opening the Gospel at random and finding her eyes falling on the very words with which our passage begins: "Then He went up on the mountain and called to Himself those whom He Himself wanted." In her thought, the whole mystery of the calling to holiness is contained in them: "He does not call those who are worthy of it, but those whom He Himself wants."
The whole passage is about the "called" and the "summoned," about the Lord's relationships with those closest to Him. Why does He choose the circle of His closest disciples? Do we have grounds to agree with Therese's words, or are we inwardly convinced that among all the listeners those chosen by Jesus were the worthiest?
In verses 28-29 there is a warning, and one of the sternest in the Gospel. Let us note: it is not Jesus who condemns the scribes. Speaking in parables, He gives them the opportunity to look and test for themselves what from what has been said applies to them. Is not this respect of His for the human conscience the key to what it means to "blaspheme the Holy Spirit"? Every other blasphemy is external: a person may "not know what he is doing." But when he blasphemes the Holy Spirit, he knows, and he does it in spite of what his own conscience is crying out. Is this not why the condemnation proves eternal, because nothing remains in a person that could raise him up?
In the last verses of the third chapter one at first sees a bitter testimony to Jesus' rejection of family ties because His relatives did not understand Him, until one realizes: the Lord does not move away from His relatives, otherwise what value would there be for the disciples in being called His "brother, and sister, and mother"? He shares with those who do the will of God His most personal, most tender, and most caring love.