Fr Paul reads from the Gospel of John (7: 40-52) in which people could not agree who Jesus was, a prophet or the Messiah.Fr Paul says, today is a real example of just how stubborn the opponents of Jesus are. You can really sense the anger and you can listen to the sarcasm of the leaders in their replies. For example, ‘prophets don’t come from Galilee’, it’s sarcastic because Galileans were despised in rabbinic schools. It was said that Galileans couldn’t even string to words together, so the hostility of the leaders of the time grows. They even pick on one of their own, Nicodemus. All Nicodemus does is argue that Jesus should be given a hearing but even this fails such is the anger against Jesus.Fr Paul also notes, we can also start to understand some of the political overtones that Jesus’s claims to be the Messiah is giving. It was long expected that the Messiah would come as a glorious warrior who would throw the Romans out but to come as a suffering servant of the Lord was just not acceptable. It is why Jesus does not use the title Messiah about himself until he is directly challenged by the High Priest.Fr Paul says, as we continue our Lenten Journey, we are aware of the anger bubbling amongst the group of Leaders facing Jesus; he suggests this might be a time for us to reflect on the areas of anger in my own life and ask for the Lord’s forgiveness and healing in those areas.