Paul writes today of how we are all united as brothers and sisters in Christ - united under one body and one Spirit; united through one Lord, one faith, and one baptism; united under one God and Father of all. In attempts to being politically correct, a lot of people in the modern world want to just refer to God and God, saying we should not assign a gender to him and should not call him Father. But, echoing the teachings of Jesus, Paul in his writings is very adamant about calling God “Father.” He states that God is “the one Father who is over all and through all and in all.”
As we celebrate the unity of our faith today in our reading from the Letter to the Ephesians, we celebrate Matthew the Apostle and Evangelist on his feast day. What is so interesting about Matthew and many of the other apostles is that they mostly came from a cross section of society, men with flaws and weaknesses like everyone else. They were not the strongest or the smartest or the most powerful. Matthew was a tax collector; he was seen as a collaborator of the occupying foreign Roman regime, someone who had betrayed his own people for his own gain and his own fortunes. But the invitation and call that Matthew received from Jesus opened his heart and his mind to the Good News, as we hear in today’s Gospel. Matthew left his old life behind and became a disciple and close friend of our Lord. He wrote the Gospel that bears his name, intended for an audience of Jewish Christians. We give thanks today for the witness of faith of Matthew and the other members of the Early Church whose faith has been passed down to us. We stand in unity and solidarity in our faith with them, united as sons and daughters of the Father of all.
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