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Gospel: Luke 11: 42-46
The Lord said:
“Woe to you Pharisees!
You pay tithes of mint and of rue and of every garden herb,
but you pay no attention to judgment and to love for God.
These you should have done, without overlooking the others.
Woe to you Pharisees!
You love the seat of honor in synagogues
and greetings in marketplaces.
Woe to you!
You are like unseen graves over which people unknowingly walk.”
Then one of the scholars of the law said to him in reply,
“Teacher, by saying this you are insulting us too.”
And he said, “Woe also to you scholars of the law!
You impose on people burdens hard to carry,
but you yourselves do not lift one finger to touch them.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
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In the Old Testament, God gave Moses the Ten Commandments, which the Israelites were invited to follow as a sign of their covenantal relationship. Examples ranged from keeping the Sabbath holy to honoring one’s mother and father.
As time passed, the religious authorities meticulously interpreted how these commandments should be followed, lest a person sin.
As a result, the list of commandments ballooned from 10 to over 600! Keeping every single one of them became tedious, expensive, and frankly, exhausting.
This is not the point of religion.
Our relationship with God is meant to be life-giving, not oppressive and burdensome, which is why Jesus is so critical of the scribes and Pharisees, who essentially hijacked their religion.
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“Woe to you!” he says. “You are like unseen graves over which people unknowingly walk.”
Just as a person was rendered ritually impure after touching a grave – and therefore unable to worship God for seven days – interacting with these religious authorities left a person spiritually dead.
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Perhaps this leaves us something to ponder: How are we different from the scribes and Pharisees? In what ways does this faith community lead others towards – not away from – God?
And elsewhere – in our families, in the workplace, in our social circles – how do we make God known in gentle, merciful ways?
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This is the role of a Christian: to be a bridge-builder, not a bridge-burner, between the human and divine.
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Image credits: (1) Christian Ethics Today (2) Jesus With the Scribes and Pharisees, Missio Dei, Public Domain (3) Church in the Valley