In today’s Gospel we hear that Herod the tetrarch was seeking to see Jesus: “Herod kept trying to see him.” Why? Herod had heard all the wondrous things that Jesus was doing. People were saying that “John has been raised from the dead.” After Herod had imprisoned John the Baptist, he listened to him preach. While he listened to him it did not lead to a conversion. In a similar way while Herod kept trying to see Jesus, he failed to truly encounter Jesus.
Pope Francis has invited each of us to a personal encounter with the Lord Jesus each day. An encounter with Jesus is more than just trying to learn facts about Jesus. An encounter is a dialogue, speaking and listening to Jesus from our heart. An encounter requires us to be vulnerable before Jesus. When I encounter Jesus, I need to be fully honest with Jesus but I also need to be humble and not think I have everything figured out. An encounter with Jesus means that at times I will stumble and bumble along with Jesus as the first disciples did. Some days the first disciples got it right, some days they got it wrong but they still kept coming to Jesus because He invited them to “come and see” Him, to encounter Him each day.
Creeds and catechisms are important because they can lead us to a deeper understanding of our faith. We always need to be humble because until we reach heaven, we will never fully understand God. What we do know now and can experience now is the love of God as we encounter Jesus each day. St. Paul reminds us that nothing can separate us from God.
“What will separate us from the love of Christ? Will anguish, or distress, or persecution…For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor present things, nor future things, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:35, 38-39).