Nearly fifty years ago, when I was eighteen, I encountered a study that changed how I understood Jesus, Scripture, and the purpose of faith.
Juan Mateos’s “The Message of Jesus” was one of my first introductions to a way of reading the New Testament that was historically informed, spiritually serious, and willing to question inherited religious assumptions. Instead of presenting Jesus only through doctrines I had been taught, Mateos placed him within the religious, political, and social struggles of his own time. The study invited me to see the message of Jesus not simply as a collection of beliefs, but as a call to a different way of living.
The essay was originally written as an introduction to a Spanish edition of the New Testament. In 1977, Sojourners introduced it to American readers through an English translation by Sister Kathleen England. Mateos, born in Spain in 1917, was a Jesuit scholar of biblical studies and church liturgy who taught at the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome.
After more than fifty years, I return to this reading with decades of experience, questioning, learning, and change. I no longer understand every part of it exactly as I once did, nor do I present it as a final authority. I share it because it helped begin my lifelong effort to understand Jesus beyond the boundaries of inherited doctrine.
It taught me that examining Scripture honestly does not require us to abandon spiritual meaning. Questions can deepen faith rather than destroy it. History can illuminate Scripture rather than diminish it. Conscience can challenge religious tradition while still leading us toward God.
As you read, consider what picture of Jesus emerges from this study. Notice what challenges you, what speaks to your experience, and what questions it raises. The purpose is not to replace one unquestioned set of answers with another. It is to begin an honest conversation about Jesus, his world, and the way his message may still call us toward truth, compassion, justice, and love.
Source note: Juan Mateos, “The Message of Jesus,” Sojourners, July 1977. English translation by Sister Kathleen England.