Tuesday of the Twenty-first Week in Ordinary Time
Many people don’t like to think about religion in terms of the “Law.” I know that many of the young people I work with would rather think about religion in “softer” ways--as a comfort or a vague sense of morality or as a place to turn when things get rough. But today’s readings remind us about the Law and about its place in our relationship to God. Jesus boldly calls the leaders in the Jewish community of his time “hypocrites” in today’s gospel reading. And this isn’t the only time he does it. Jesus calls them this and other scathing things throughout the gospels. Jesus seems particularly interested in them precisely because of their hypocrisy. Today’s reading is all about following the Law, the Torah. The Pharisees are concerned with external things but Jesus challenges them on this point. It’s as if they are only doing the dishes to show off to mom and dad, not to really be clean and serve others for the next meal. They are doing “things” but they are not concerned with whether or not those things are making them holier.
The Pharisees are so concerned with being “clean,” but only in order to maintain their stature and place of power. They are not concerned with the true purpose of the Law. As Catholics, we may not follow the same body of ritual laws as the Jewish community but we do know something about rules and regulations in our faith. Today’s reading reminds us that all of these regulated practices should have as their goal a purifying effect on our inner selves. But this effect isn’t just internal; the internal will also affect our relationships, both with God and each other. The true purpose of the Law in the Hebrew Bible is about justice. It’s about cultivating a sense of self and community that honors all people and honors the Creator. It is about reminding ourselves of the source of our existence and the dignity of all God’s created order.
We are challenged today to take stock of our internal selves, to look into the bowl and see how clean we are. The outside of the bowl is important: we must maintain its integrity just like we should maintain the integrity of all our external religious practices. But we also have to pay attention to whether or not we are allowing ourselves to be formed by these externalities. Is all of this activity focusing our hearts on the cause of justice? Are we becoming more attuned to the love of God and its capacity to envelop all God’s people? Or are we like the Pharisees, doing the dishes only for the attention?
- Katherine Schmidt