“When faced with the gravity of sin, God responds with the fullness of mercy. Mercy will always be greater than any sin, and no one can place limits on the love of God who is ever ready to forgive.”

So Jonah got a do-over. And he got up and preached to Nineveh. He told them the truth. And the truth set them free. Quite literally.

Jonah has just been vomited up by a fish, not that the first few verses of chapter 3 would indicate that.

I first met Jonathon Edwards and his infamous sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” inside an American literature book in eleventh grade. It was startling.

Today we join Jonah in the belly of the fish.

I think this verse pretty much sums up the entire story of Jonah - or at least the part of the story that everyone knows. I almost skipped over it. Of course Jonah got swallowed by the big fish.

This is such a quiet verse; so small and just before the really big story line begins.

Then they said to him, “What shall we do to you, that the sea may quiet down for us?” For the sea grew more and more tempestuous.

And they said to one another,

“Come, let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us.”

And they said to one another, “Come, let us cast lots, that we may know on whose account this evil has come upon us.” So they cast lots, and the lot fell upon Jonah.

I’m a terrible judge of character. Awful. I spend a lot of time in my own head and when I finally remember to look out, I am often catching a glimpse of the thing that jolted me into the real world to begin with.

December 8, 2015 - the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception - marked the start of an Extraordinary Year of Mercy, called by Pope Francis that we might “gaze even more attentively on mercy so that we may become a more effective sign of the Father’s action in our lives.”