GO BACK TO THE SOURCE

This week is a very busy one at St. Martha’s since there is a homeless sheltering and feeding scheduled there. This activity is a picture of love and compassion for our needy brothers and sisters in Christ. People who are able to serve them in such an activity have always the same thing to say which is it gives them a sense of fulfillment to be part of it. It gives a feeling that God is so pleased with such activities. On top of these civic works that we do for our less fortunate brothers and sisters it is also imperative that we pray for them hoping that someday they would be able to rise up from their present situation. It is not just a prayer for them but for each one of us to strive to not just become a better person for the Lord but the best. Amen. Hallelujah!

1 Kings 8:22-23, 27-30
...Look kindly on the prayer and petition of your servant, O LORD, my God, and listen to the cry of supplication which I, your servant, utter before you this day...

We have to go the extra mile always in doing everything in love. God is love and He is in us. We should be careful not to taint and mess up ourselves and this is only possible if we take good care of God's dwelling place as suggested in today's psalm. We are the temple or dwelling place of God and this we should know by now and always be aware of. Amen. Hallelujah!


P S A L M

Psalm 84:3. 4. 5-6a and 8a. 11
R: How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord, mighty God!
...[6] Blessed the men whose strength you are! 7 [8] They go from strength to strength. (R) 10 [11] I had rather one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I had rather lie at the threshold of the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked...

The Pharisees and the scribes in today’s gospel are so obsessed about the tradition but have missed the most important point. The scribes and Pharisees put a fence around the law to make sure they do not break the law. An example of this is the 2nd commandment which is “Thou shall not use the Lord’s name in vain.” In order to make sure that they don’t break the law they were not allowed to even say the Lord’s name at all. Jesus does not tell us that tradition is bad but if it goes to the point of disregarding the spirit of the law which is love then it is just for nothing because it does not please God at all. Since it goes beyond to the point where some use the details of the law to undercut the law. The worst part here is when criminals go free. This mentality applies to certain laws. In everything we do we have to be clear with our motivations and agenda that we don’t tip the scale and do one thing for the extreme reasons and neglect a whole lot of things. This reminds me of certain rules that we needed to strictly follow during the feeding of the homeless like the wearing of hairnets and gloves. We found out that there was a particular incident in one Church during a feeding when somebody was sued for not wearing a hairnet while in the kitchen. Sometimes these rules which were meant to protect the people can be used to the detriment of unsuspecting people most especially the ones who only meant to help and be of service to the needy. What God is telling us is to go back to the source of scriptures and not use our own imagination to use the law for our personal agenda. We sometimes hear people say that they do not have any sins since they have not killed anybody. Sometimes we tend to make a criminal like Al Capone as the norm. We have to stop comparing ourselves to the worst kind of criminals. We have to go back to the real source of the scriptures and the laws. Jesus is our moral source and He should be our model. What God intends us to do is to examine our conscience to live our Christian life well. Lent is up coming and we need to prepare for a deeper repentance so we don’t get called hypocrites by our Lord but instead welcome us to fidelity to Him and the gospel. Amen. Hallelujah!

Mark 7:1-13
He responded, “Well did Isaiah prophesy about you hypocrites, as it is written: ‘This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; 7 In vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines human precepts.” 8 You disregard God’s commandment but cling to human tradition.” 9 He went on to say, “How well you have set aside the commandment of God in order to uphold your tradition! 10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and ‘Whoever curses father or mother shall die.’ 11 Yet you say, ‘If someone says to father or mother, “Any support you might have had from me is qorban’” (meaning, dedicated to God), 12 you allow him to do nothing more for his father or mother. 13 You nullify the word of God in favor of your tradition that you have handed on. And you do many such things.”