Tuesday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time
A new semester is just beginning at the University at Dayton. For those of us privileged to teach there, that means we have been hard at work on our syllabi for our courses. Much of the work that goes into a syllabus focuses on the substance of the course—the readings, discussion topics, paper assignments, and so forth. Just as important as the content for a course are the rules set forth in a syllabus that determine such matters as when assignments are due, whether late work will be accepted, and how many absences are allowed.
While rules about attendance and deadlines are very important, perhaps even more important are rules about academic integrity. If a student submits work as if it is their own but it is not, that is very serious. My syllabi always stipulate that a student caught plagiarizing someone else’s work will likely receive a failing grade for the course. That’s because doing one’s own work goes to the heart of earning credit for the course. If a student doesn’t do their own work for the course, they haven’t really taken the course. Beyond that, of course, they’ve stolen someone else’s work.
Rules are really important. Arguably, without them a class wouldn’t really be a class. It would be something else. It might be a friendly gathering or even an interesting conversation. But it wouldn’t be a class. The same is true of a lot of things. Can you imagine a baseball game with no rules? It might be a bunch of people running around with bats and balls, but it wouldn’t be baseball. Or a language with no rules—no grammar? Good luck making any sense!
To be sure, Jesus understands the importance of rules—and, in particular, the rules for the Sabbath. Without the Sabbath and the rules governing it that say no work and no harvesting, it wouldn’t really be a Sabbath. And without a Sabbath—if we never set aside time from work to be quiet, to pray, to study Scripture, to worship—would it really make sense to call ourselves people of faith?
But Jesus also wants to say something more in the text from Mark before us today. Here he instructs us to remember not just what the rules are but who they were made for. His point is: they were made for us.
It is all too tempting once a set of rules have been set forth, whether on a syllabus or among a people of faith, to make too much of them and to forget that the rules were made for the students (so they can learn) or for the people of faith (so they can worship). They weren’t made for themselves, and they should not be enforced for their own sake.
This is such an important point and one easily forgotten. Once a rule is set down (as in a syllabus) it can feel like it has to be upheld no matter what. Often our pride can get tied up in a rule (precisely because rules define the thing we are doing). We want to guarantee the rule no matter what in order to protect the class or the game or the religion.
But this is a mistake, Jesus is saying to us today.
For all of us who create and/or enforce rules—whether as parents, teachers, bosses, coaches, or whatever—may we do so with the love and humility that comes from hearing Jesus’s words today. Amen.
- Sue Trollinger