Tuesday of Week 21 of Ordinary Time – Gospel

Commentary on Matthew 23:23-26

We continue our reading of the ‘Seven Woes’ listed in the commentary from Monday of Week 21. Today’s reading contains the fourth and fifth ‘woes’.

4. …you tithe mint, dill and cumin… (vv 23-24)

In continuing his attack on Pharisaism, Jesus touches on two issues which are certainly relevant to our Christian living today. First, he attacks the mentality of those who are sticklers for tiny details of ritual or doctrine while ignoring the fundamental issues of justice, compassion and good faith. The Mosaic Law levied a tithe on agricultural produce. Some rabbis scrupulously applied the law to the most insignificant of plants.

A strict Pharisee too would carefully filter his drinking water in case he might swallow a small insect, which would be regarded as unclean. But in being so careful of such minutiae, he might well overlook matters of much deeper importance. Jesus is not criticising a conscientious carrying out of rules and regulations, but it is the attitude of hypocritical moral superiority which he attacks.

One can meet Catholics too who tie themselves in knots trying to observe the most petty regulations and can end up becoming the prisoner of scruples. What is more, they can be highly critical of others whom they regard as ‘lax’. An example might be people who are more worried about not having observed a full 60 minutes of fast before Communion than focusing on what the wider implications of participating in the Eucharist really mean.

5. …you clean the outside of the cup and of the plate… (vv 25-26)

The second point that Jesus makes is to criticise those who concentrate on the tiniest details of external behaviour while totally ignoring the inner spirit. There are certain Christians who speak and write at length about all the things that are not being done right in the liturgy of the Catholic Church, and who claim for themselves a level of doctrinal and moral orthodoxy to which even Rome does not attain. Sometimes even the Pope does not come up to their expectations.

What is striking about these people is the almost total absence of a sense of love and compassion in their writings and actions. They are only interested in ‘truth’ and ‘orthodoxy’, as if these things could exist outside of the nitty-gritty of human living. They can be more concerned about the tiniest rubrical details of the liturgy than about the Eucharist as truly a sacrament of a loving community prayerfully centred on the Person of Christ.

On the outside, the behaviour is impeccable, but inside there is a total lack of a true gospel spirit—the spirit of love and integrity, of compassion and a sense of justice for all. Instead, there can be a heart full of self-righteousness, criticism, anger, resentment or contempt for those who do not think the same, all cloaked in this outer veneer of moral and ritual rectitude.

The two attitudes are closely related and all of us can be touched by them in one degree or another. Let him or her who has never criticised another fellow-Christian cast the first stone!

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Tuesday of Week 21 of Ordinary Time – First Reading

Commentary on 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3,14-17

In the First Letter to the Thessalonians (the earliest extant letter of Paul that we have), Paul seemed to be saying that the second and final coming of the Lord was imminent, although he was careful not to specify a particular time.

Apparently replying to further questions, Paul (or the actual author) in this second letter does not repeat all that was said in the first letter about what would happen to the living and the dead. What is being written here is supplementary to Paul’s oral teaching and the instructions contained in the earlier letter. All he is concerned with is to emphasise that the Lord’s final coming is not imminent, and that it cannot take place till certain specific signs have preceded it.

Although the Second Coming and its prelude is a major theme of this letter, Paul warns the Christians:

…not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as though from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord is already here.

In other words, they are not to be alarmed by predictions (false prophecies), rumours or spurious letters supposed to have come from Paul suggesting that the “day of the Lord” is already on them.

“Shaken in mind” translates a verb often used of a ship adrift from its moorings and suggests a lack of stability. Here it suggests a kind of panic at the supposed imminence of the Lord’s coming. The Christians are not to be deceived by such false alarms.

The expression “the day of the Lord” comes originally from the prophet Amos (5:18). In the Old Testament, it is a time when God will come and intervene with judgement and/or blessing. In the New Testament, the thought of judgement continues, but it is also the ‘day of redemption’, the ‘day of God’, or of Christ, and the ‘last day’, the ‘great day’ or simply ‘the day’. It is the climax of all things. There will be some preliminary signs, but the coming will be as unexpected as that of “a thief in the night”.

In the second and final part of the reading, the author reminds the Christians to focus on the gospel which has been preached to them and which has as its final purpose a sharing in the glory of Jesus Christ as Lord:

[Jesus] called you through our gospel, so that you may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

“Our gospel” is the gospel preached by Paul, Silas and Timothy, that they themselves had received by faith. It is, of course, first of all God the Father’s because it originates from him, and Christ’s because it springs from his sacrificial death.

Let the Christians forget about worrying when this sharing in glory will actually take place, and concentrate on living out the “traditions”, i.e. the teachings which they had received from Paul and the other Apostles, either orally or in writing. This refers to what Paul taught them when he was in Thessalonica. Since he returned from there, what he had written to them includes, in the message of the Good News, the principles on which a Christian should lead his life.

Until the New Testament took its final form, essential Christian teaching was passed on in the ‘traditions’ (a word which comes from the Latin ‘to hand on’ or ‘hand over’), just as rabbinic law was, and it could be either oral or written. The four Gospels which we have now are basically built up from such written and oral ‘traditions’.

The passage ends with a lovely Pauline prayer, very similar to one in the same place in the first letter and which also includes the words “encourage” and “strengthen” (1 Thess 3:11-13). The prayer is for inner strength that will produce results in both action and speech. It is a prayer we could say often for each other and for all those we know and love (or especially for those we find it difficult to love):

Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself
and God our Father, who loved us and through grace
gave us eternal comfort and good hope
comfort your hearts and strengthen them
in every good work and word.

At every age in the Church’s history, including our own, there are people who are convinced that the ‘end of the world is nigh’ and that Christ is coming in Judgement at any moment. Certain key periods, such as the end of a century or, even more, the end of a millennium, have produced a veritable rash of such warnings. So far, they have never proved accurate.

We would be better off listening to the advice of today’s letter and focusing our energies on living out the gospel each and every day in truth and love. This is the best possible preparation we can make for that time which will come “like a thief in the night”.

And, as has been said more than once in these reflections, a much more realistic end for us to consider is that of our own life than that of the universe or our planet. In either case, however, the recommended advice is the same: live the gospel day in and day out and the rest will take care of itself.

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