Date: Sunday, August 30, 2015
In the Gospel today Jesus says: “Hear me, all of you, and understand.” The word: “hear” is significant. It begins the daily Jewish prayer: “Shema.” “Hear, Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One. Blessed be the name of His glorious kingdom forever and ever. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be in your heart. And you shall teach them diligently to your children, and you shall speak of them when you sit at home, and when you walk along the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up. And you shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be frontlets between your eyes. And you shall write them on the door posts of your house and on your gates.” Moses uses the same word “shema” in our first reading. It means to listen and to obey. James in his letter (our second reading) writes: “Humbly welcome the word that has been planted in you and is able to save your souls. Be doers of the word and not hearers only…” For James, “religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” True religion must be lived apart from the place of worship. As Dennis the Menace remarks as he walks out of Church with his parents: “Grandma says: Church begins when you walk out the door.” Jesus, in debate with the Pharisees and scribes, insists that public living of the faith must be in harmony with the disposition of our hearts. It must be more than external show that hides the evil thoughts and impulses in our hearts i.e. unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, envy, arrogance. The outer behavior of a person must be a window of his/her soul. We offer a high compliment when we say there is no duplicity in a person. A hypocrite is one who wears a mask. Let us live our Catholic faith in harmony and transparency with no disconnect between how we act and what we hold dear in our hearts.