Rules versus Religion. Where does Jesus stand?

***

Gospel: Mark 2: 23-28

As Jesus was passing through a field of grain on the sabbath,
his disciples began to make a path while picking the heads of grain.
At this the Pharisees said to him,
“Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the sabbath?”
He said to them,
“Have you never read what David did
when he was in need and he and his companions were hungry?
How he went into the house of God when Abiathar was high priest
and ate the bread of offering that only the priests could lawfully eat,
and shared it with his companions?”
Then he said to them,
“The sabbath was made for man, not man for the sabbath.
That is why the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath.”

The Gospel of the Lord.

***

***

Throughout the Gospels, there’s only one group of people whom Jesus cannot stomach. Surprisingly, perhaps, it isn’t tax collectors, prostitutes, or sinners.

He loved and forgave them.

The ones whom Jesus cannot tolerate are the hardened religious leaders of his day, who pressed the Jews into following hundreds of man-made laws, including a law which forbade people from eating grain on the Sabbath, as we hear in today’s Gospel.

What good is it to follow a series of rules if doing so does not lead to spiritual growth?

This is why Jesus says elsewhere, the authorities are like “whitewashed tombs,” presentable on the outside, but defiled within.

***

Catholics are similar to the extent that we try following a series of rules. We attend Mass on Sundays. We say our prayers. We avoid eating meat on Fridays in Lent.

But if following these rules does not lead to inner growth, then what good are they?

***

This is proof of real religion: serving God in our neighbor.

As Saint John tells us, “Whoever does not love a brother or sister whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.”

Think of a neighbor. Find a way to love them today.

That, more than going through the motions, will be pleasing to God.

***

***

Image credits: (1) Potomac Baptist Church (2) Wheat Field With Reaper and Sun, Van Gogh (3) Unsplash