What
comes from God, is holy. That is the basic “gist” of the theme
for today's readings. We are being invited to trust that what comes
from God is holy, and therefore is what's best for us. We should not
replace something that is holy with something inferior.
In
the first reading from the Book of Deuteronomy we are told, “Now,
Israel, hear the statutes and decrees which I am teaching you to
observe”. And further along we are told, “In your observance of
the commandments of the LORD, your God, which I enjoin upon you, you
shall not add to what I command you nor subtract from it.” As I
said before, what comes from God is holy. The statutes and decrees
come from God and we are to observe them. But we mustn't replace
them either. Sometimes we are tempted to subtract things that we do
not agree with personally or add things that we think are better. We
are being told not to do that. We'll get to why that's the case in a
moment.
The
second reading comes from the Letter of James and continues on the
this theme of what is holy. “All good giving and every perfect
gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights,” we are
told. “Humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you and is
able to save your souls.” We are invited to accept the Word of God
into our hearts. It is holy and perfect. We could not want for
anything better.
The
Gospel puts things into perspective. The Pharisees think they have
finally trapped Jesus as they try to call out His disciples for
violating one of the many dietary laws that the Pharisees enforced.
Namely, that a person should cleanse their hands before eating. This
refers to a ritual cleansing that had more do do with making the
person spiritually clean, as opposed to being hygienic. It should be
noted as well that this rule about washing hands comes from the
“tradition of the elders”. These were unwritten rules that were
passed on orally but were given the same importance as the written
laws of the Old Testament. So they weren't given by God, but were
added by human beings. Jesus helps to explain why this matters.
“Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person; but
the things that come out from within are what defile.” Now on one
hand, Jesus is simply responding directly to what the Pharisees had
said. Outside things don't defile a person: eating food without
ritually washing one's hands is not going to bring about sin or
defilement on ourselves. It is what comes from within that causes
sin. As Jesus explains later on, it's what comes from a person's
heart, like evil thoughts, murder, envy, greed, and the like that are
the real problem.
When
we think about these words of Jesus a bit more, we can see that He is
also talking about the very same thing that we have been talking
about with Deuteronomy and the Letter of James. Everything that is
outside of us, whether we are talking about all of creation, or the
words of Scripture that God has given us, or the statutes and decrees
and commandments that God gave us, has been made by God and is
therefore good. There is nothing wrong with God's words or with what
He made. What comes from within, however, that's another story.
We
all know that we have many different choices that we can make
everyday. We can choose to do what God wants us to do, but we can
also choose to do what we want to do. Doing what God wants is of
course good and holy. Doing what we want, however, sometimes leads
to things becoming twisted and distorted and might lead to sin. That
is why the reading from Deuteronomy tells us not to add to or
subtract from the commandments that have been given to us. God's
word is already perfect and holy. If we try to add our own ideas of
what will make it better or take away the parts we think are silly or
unimportant, we are only adding what has come from us and getting
farther from God.
Sin
can be defined as a deliberate thought, word, deed, or omission
against the law of God. When we sin we are basically taking
something that God has given us and twisted it and deformed into
something that we want for ourselves. We can look at the Seven
Deadly Sins as examples of this. The sin of pride is at the root of
all other sins. But there is such a thing as a healthy pride. We
can take pride in our work, pride in our community, pride is our
parish. It becomes a sin when we allow that good pride to become
twisted and allow our own pride to get in the way. Greed is the
disordered desire for pleasure and possessions. It's okay to want to
feel good and have nice things, but we can't let ourselves be overly
possessive. Sometimes we might feel jealous of another person's
talents or possessions. This can encourage us to work harder to
attain praiseworthy goals and to celebrate other people's success,
but it can also turn into sadness and the desire to possess those
things ourselves, which is envy.
We
have probably all watched the news and felt righteous anger when we
hear about crime and injustice around the world. This type of anger
can encourage us to work for good in the world. But if it gets
twisted into the sin of anger or wrath, it can lead to worse sins.
With gluttony we overindulge in food and drink. We need food and
water to survive, but we don't have to go overboard. We also need
time to rest and to recharge our batteries after doing some hard
work. But if we allow it to twist into laziness, we fall into sloth.
Finally, lust is simply the twisting of love. If love is about
putting someone else's needs before our own, then lust is using
another person for our own wants and desires.
Sin
is about doing our own thing; we are basically adding to or
subtracting from the law of God. Virtue, the opposite of sin, is
about doing God's will. May God give us the virtues necessary to
continue following His will and all His commandments.
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