We owe St. Mark a great deal. He understood the power of story, that telling the story of Jesus would lead people to faith. Before Mark the sayings of Jesus and the reports of what he had done circulated in an anecdotal way. Mark gathered the material together in a coherent narrative that would lead us to say, as the centurion did, “Truly this man was the Son of God.” Hence, the irony that the passage chosen for the liturgy of this day was not written by St. Mark himself! It was appended to the text Mark had written. A good reminder that while we are all called to be evangelizers, to spread the story of Jesus as Mark did, God gives the growth.
