Author: admin

***

Gospel: Mark 3: 1-6

Jesus entered the synagogue.
There was a man there who had a withered hand.
They watched Jesus closely
to see if he would cure him on the sabbath
so that they might accuse him.
He said to the man with the withered hand,
“Come up here before us.”
Then he said to the Pharisees,
“Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil,
to save life rather than to destroy it?”
But they remained silent.
Looking around at them with anger
and grieved at their hardness of heart,
Jesus said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.”
He stretched it out and his hand was restored.
The Pharisees went out and immediately took counsel
with the Herodians against him to put him to death.

The Gospel of the Lord.

***

***

In ancient Palestine, most men made a living through manual labor. Joseph, for example, was a carpenter. Paul was a tent maker. Peter was a fisherman. Tradition states that this man in the Gospel was a stone mason.

Like many other professions, masonry required the use of both hands. Thus, the man’s withered hand not only prevents him from working; it’s also symbolic of his state in life.

He’s paralyzed; all income and opportunity have dried up. His withered hand also represents the withered hearts of the religious authorities, who’ve become deadened inside through a harsh interpretation of the Law.

***

The fact that the religious authorities don’t care about this man’s healing, or wish that Jesus would simply do it on another day, implies they’ve placed boundaries around compassion.

It’s okay to be compassionate six days a week, but don’t dare lift a finger on the Sabbath; that’s God’s day, as if God could ever rest from charity. 

This is what angers Jesus so much. The authorities have a tiny, boxed-in, bound and broken view of God. They fail to understand that whenever there is an opportunity for charity, it must be done because charity is an act of love.

And God is love.

***

Today’s Gospel provides all of us an opportunity to reflect upon our own limits. 

Where are the withered edges of our own heart? When have we seen an opportunity to be charitable – to give, to forgive, to love, or to serve – and not acted upon it?

***

“Jesus said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He stretched it out and his hand was restored.”

Yes, God worked on the Sabbath. Charity demanded it.

May that same zealous love of neighbor burn within our hearts today.

***

***

Image credits: (1) PottyPadre (2) Catholic Daily Reflections (3) Pitt News

***

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.

***

***

There’s only one group of people whom Jesus cannot stomach. Surprisingly, perhaps, isn’t tax collectors, prostitutes, or sinners. 

He loved them 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 a transformation of the heart?

This is why Jesus says elsewhere, the scribes and Pharisees are like “whitewashed tombs,” religious rule-followers on the outside, but defiled within.

***

Catholics also follow a series of rules. We attend Mass on Sunday. We say our prayers. We avoid eating meat on Fridays during Lent. These guidelines are meant to lead us to an inner transformation. 

Receiving Jesus in the Eucharist becomes “food for the journey.” Praying the rosary allows us to intercede on behalf of others. Avoiding meat on Fridays in Lent reminds us of the sacrifice that Christ made in his flesh on the Cross.

But if we aren’t mindful of why we’re doing these things, then their lasting impact begins to wane. 

***

Today’s Gospel isn’t meant to upend the “rules” we follow or the devotions we practice. Rather, it’s meant to make us more aware of why we follow them – to encounter the Divine. 

What is my religious practice like? What difference has it made in my spiritual journey? How do I encounter God?

***

Anyone who puts their heart and soul into seeking Christ will not only find him; slowly, they will also become more and more like him – holy, innocent, and pure of heart.

May that include us today.

***

***

Image credits: (1) Radically Christian, Wes McAdams (2) Bread for Beggars (3) Ottawa Church of Christ

***

Hebrews 5: 1-10

Brothers and sisters:
Every high priest is taken from among men
and made their representative before God,
to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins.
He is able to deal patiently with the ignorant and erring,
for he himself is beset by weakness
and so, for this reason, must make sin offerings for himself
as well as for the people.
No one takes this honor upon himself
but only when called by God,
just as Aaron was.
In the same way,
it was not Christ who glorified himself in becoming high priest,
but rather the one who said to him:
You are my Son:
this day I have begotten you;
just as he says in another place,
You are a priest forever
according to the order of Melchizedek.
In the days when he was in the Flesh,
he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears
to the one who was able to save him from death,
and he was heard because of his reverence.
Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered;
and when he was made perfect,
he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him.

The Word of the Lord.

***

***

These are some of the most honest, humbling words I’ve read about priesthood in scripture. In our first reading from the Letter to the Hebrews it is written:

“Every high priest is taken from among men and made their representative before God, to offer gifts and sacrifices for sins. He is able to deal patiently with the ignorant and erring, because he himself is beset by weakness.”

***

He himself is beset by weakness.

***

Before a priest is ordained, he makes three promises: prayer, celibacy, and obedience. Some also make the promise of life-long poverty.

Why don’t priests promise something easily achievable? Or something requiring less sacrifice? 

Each of our promises are sown into the fields of human weakness, and that’s precisely the point.

***

One of the first lessons learned in the spiritual life is that we cannot become holy – or pleasing to God – on our own. We depend upon the Lord.

By God’s grace, every priest can live out his promises faithfully, even joyfully.

And by extension, every Christian can live a joyful life pleasing to God. We can live as devoted spouses, generous servants, faithful friends, and holy intercessors, even as we are beset by weakness.

Faith is not trusting in what we can do on our own; it’s trusting that we can do all things, even what seems impossible, through Christ who strengthens us.

This is the transformative power Jesus is speaking about in today’s Gospel – pouring new wine into fresh wineskins.

***

“He himself is beset by weakness.”

Today, let’s pray for all priests, especially those who struggle, that God’s grace, often dispensed through friends, would sustain their ministry. And let’s pray for one another, that each of us would be stretched into the saint God created us to be.

Not by any effort of our own, but by the power of Him who has loved us and given himself for us.

***

***

Image credits: (1) Diocese of Westminster (2) Freepic (3) Lewis Center for Church Leadership