Tuesday of the Twenty-eighth Week in Ordinary Time
We have strong readings today! St. Paul’s letter to the Romans gives us an unsettling warning, and Jesus scorns the people who invited him over for dinner. What a dynamic God we serve; sometimes gentle, sometimes very stern.
Jesus and the Pharisee are talking about cleanliness. What makes you clean? On the outside, it’s obvious; a shower or bath, clean clothes, soap and water. What about on the inside? Jesus says giving to the poor (almsgiving) will do it for the Pharisee, who was concerned only with his own pious behavior and not with loving and helping others.
Paul also talks about cleanliness, in the form of purity. What do you desire, in the deepest part of your being? Our surface desires often consume us so much that we don’t have time to pay attention to our deeper, holy longing for God and the Kingdom. The Pharisee was distracted by an obsession to follow all God’s rules, and failed to see the loving God behind those rules. Paul suggests that what keeps us from being clean is sin, which manipulates our (otherwise holy) desires, turning them into vices. Our unwillingness to perceive the creator God in our created bodies can warp our goodness and make it bad. Paul lets the Romans (and us) know that if we fail to find God in creation, we will be torn apart by our surface desires. But if we take the time in prayer to go with God into our longing, and faithfully search for what is holy there, we will be delivered from death and brought into life. We will find God, and God is always enough for us.
What is creation telling you about God? It’s a big question, but Paul tells us “…eternal power and divinity have been able to be understood and perceived in what he has made.” We can learn a lot about God from what God has made, whether the world of nature or the bodies we are blessed with. What is He revealing to you about Holiness, Love, and Grace in the world of your day-to-day life?
Let us take the time now to go with God to the place of longing in our hearts, and seek God’s help to make it clean and holy. Let’s avoid the dirt. The Spirit will transform our hearts and inspire in us a longing to give alms, to help our brothers and sisters by sharing all the goodness God has given to us.
-Chris Nieport