THE JEWISH RITES OF PURIFICATION
Today’s Gospel reminds us that rituals and liturgy have the power to transform us only when our hearts are grounded in God’s love — especially when we, who are in the wilderness, are in need of God’s cleansing grace.
.THE JEWISH RITES OF PURIFICATION
In today’s gospel, we have a discourse concerning the Jewish ritual of hand-washing and purification of vessels. It originated to express a deeply felt reverence and love for God. But by Jesus’ time, the meaning was forgotten. The Pharisees continued imposing and expanding the rule, even though it had degenerated into an empty and oppressive ritual.
THE DISPUTE..
They were scandalized that some of Jesus’ disciples ate their meal with unclean hands. The phrase in the Greek is literally ate breads, linking this dispute with the miracle of Jesus feeding the 5,000 who ate breads in Mk 6:35-44. The Pharisees were angered, even though the crowd in the wilderness had no opportunity to wash their hands. They challenged Jesus on this breach of ancient tradition.
JESUS’ RESPONSE
Jesus responded by calling them hypocrites, literally stage actors, whose outward apparent piety disguised their empty hearts and empty ritual. Jesus was not rejecting tradition per se. Rather, he was rejecting their human tradition and their hypocrisy in how they practiced these traditions.
THE DANGER…
Like the Pharisees, we too may risk turning meaningful traditions — and disciplines — into empty legalistic and oppressive ritual. Whether it is the ritual washing of hands for the Jews of Jesus’ day, or in our day Friday abstention, or even the way we celebrate at Eucharist — do we merely consume bread and wine, or are we transformed by the body and blood? Do we acknowledge that we are in God’s presence at Mass and God’s presence is within us or we do things just for mere show?
WALK THE TALK
According to Pope Paul VI, ‘A man teaches with moral authority only that which he does and practices but when the conscience becomes an obstacle to speech, then what is preached becomes difficult to accept’. It means simply : PRACTICE WHAT YOU PREACH!
GOD SEES OUR INNERMOST CONSCIENCE
The fact is that God sees you. He knows our minds and speaks to our conscience in order for us to share in the fullness of the joy He brings to us. Therefore. a proper daily examination of conscience will help our conscience formation. It is a training that comes with discipline while committing everything into the hands of God.
WITH CONSCIENCE FORMATION…
Provision is made most plenteously; all is provided that man can need to quench his soul’s thirst. To his conscience the atonement brings peace; to his understanding the gospel brings the richest instruction; to his heart the person of Jesus is the noblest object of affection; to the whole man the truth as it is in Jesus supplies the purest nutriment. Thirst is terrible, but Jesus can remove it. Though the soul were utterly famished, Jesus could restore it.
SCRIPTURAL TEXTS
-So let us come near to God with a sincere heart and a sure faith, with hearts that have been purified from a guilty conscience and with bodies washed with clean water.-Hebrews 10:22
-Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved; whoever does not believe will be condemned. Mark 16:16
Osho
