Models of the Kingdom!

Saturday, August 16, 2025

Jos 24:14-29; Mt 19:13-15

Today’s Gospel highlights children as the worthy models of the Kingdom of Heaven.

In the Gospel, while Jesus upholds and praises childlike virtues as the most desired for inheriting God’s Kingdom, his fondness and inclusion of children contain a liberative message too. 

In Jesus’ view, children are models of the Kingdom in two ways. 

In A Spiritual Sense: When Jesus says that the ‘Kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these,’ he reverses conventional expectations that discipleship is not about power or priority but about humility and trust. In his explanation, Jesus also shows that God’s Kingdom is not earned by our human effort but received with childlike faith. Thus, the children who represent all such virtues become models of the Kingdom in a very spiritual sense.

In A Liberative Sense: When Jesus rebukes those who prevent children from coming to him and puts them forward as models of the Kingdom, he practices a radical inclusivity that people who belong to the Kingdom are called to imitate. Jesus’ gesture also declares his commitment toward the marginalized of his time, like women, children, the sick, the poor, and sinners. It is no exaggeration to claim that by championing the cause of the downtrodden, Jesus directly challenges and confronts systems of exclusion.

Jesus’ recognition of the children as agents of the Kingdom shows that the Kingdom of God is a place for all, defying conventional expectations regarding God’s preferential option.

Let us pray that our understanding of spirituality be enhanced through our tireless commitment to social action.

Fr. Dhinakaran Savariyar