In today's Gospel from St. Mark, Jesus encounters a sincere scribe. The passage offers us an insight into the Kingdom of God and our own role in spreading its influence: And when Jesus saw that he answered with understanding, he said to him, "You are not far from the Kingdom of God." And no one dared to ask him any more questions." (Mk. 12:28-34)

The kind of all consuming, single minded, all encompassing love for God offered in the response of the Scribe is what Jesus affirmed. It is also the key which opens the door to living now in the Kingdom of God.

Jesus has inaugurated the Kingdom. The Catholic Catechism explains "To carry out the will of the Father Christ inaugurated the kingdom of heaven on earth." Now the Father's will is "to raise up men to share in his own divine life". He does this by gathering men around his Son Jesus Christ. This gathering is the Church, "on earth the seed and beginning of that kingdom". (CCC #541)

We can spread the kingdom by living in the heart of the Church for the sake of the world. There, living in His Body, we continue His redemptive mission and advance the spread and influence of the Kingdom. Our membership in the Church is a participation in the life of God; what the Apostle Peter referred to as a "participation in the Divine nature". (2 Peter 1:4)

It is thereby a participation in the kingdom of which the Church is both a seed and sign. In one of its numerous and rich expositions of the mystery of the kingdom, the Catechism of the Catholic Church explains: "It was the Son's task to accomplish the Father's plan of salvation in the fullness of time. Its accomplishment was the reason for his being sent. "The Lord Jesus inaugurated his Church by preaching the Good News, that is, the coming of the Reign of God, promised over the ages in the scriptures." To fulfill the Father's will, Christ ushered in the Kingdom of heaven on earth. The Church "is the Reign of Christ already present in mystery." (CCC #763)