Who is my family?

For more commentary on this week's readings, see the Reflections on the Lectionary page, which includes Blumhofer's current Living by the Word column as well as past magazine and blog content. For full-text access to all articles, subscribe to the Century.

In Jesus’ day—as in ours--redefining the family is a provocative act with far-reaching social, political, moral and spiritual implications. If we were to isolate Jesus in Mark 3 from the moments in the other gospels in which Jesus interacts with his family, we might conclude this story with George Aichele’s sharply worded assertion, “Mark’s Jesus is no supporter of family values!”

But rather than focusing on how to define the nuclear family--something that scripture addresses more constructively in other passages--this text from Mark draws our attention toward the new family that God creates in the church, and it prompts us to consider the far-reaching implications of redefining the family around membership in a new community.