A Lectio Divina Approach to the Sunday Liturgy
BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD (Series 4, n. 17)
Third Sunday of Lent, Year B – March 19, 2006
“Towards the New Covenant”
BIBLE READINGS
Ex 20:1-17 // I Cor 1:22-25 // Jn 2:13-25
N.B. This new series of BREAKING THE BREAD OF THE WORD: A LECTIO DIVINA APPROACH TO THE SUNDAY LITURGY presents a biblico-liturgical study of the Old Testament reading of each Sunday Mass to serve as background for a better understanding of the Gospel proclaimed in the liturgy. For a biblico-liturgical study of the Gospel for each Sunday, please go to the PDDM Web Archives: WWW.PDDM.US.
I. BIBLICO-LITURGICAL REFLECTIONS
MARYKNOLL magazine, published by Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers, never fails to inspire me. In its March 2006 issue, Sean Sprague presents the laudable work of Christine Bodewes, a Maryknoll lay missioner in Kenya (cf. “Sowing Seeds in the Slums”, p. 32-34). Eight years ago, Christine left her Chicago law firm and went to the Kenyan capital of Nairobi to run a legal aid clinic. Many of her cases involved defending the slum dwellers’ right to their land. Four years later, she responded to an invitation from the Mexican Guadalupe Fathers to set up a human rights office in Christ the King parish, in the heart of Kibera, the largest slum in Nairobi. Christine narrated, “I spent a year trying to understand the complex ethnic, political, social and economic issues of Kibera. I didn’t have a strategy, but I spent a lot of time listening to people. I saw that human rights education was the key to the ministry.” She therefore networked and pulled together a part-time team of volunteering professional Kenyan lawyers, who created a curriculum to teach civic education to people who were ignorant of their rights. Later she was able to hire four full-time, paid employees, all Kibera residents and they broadened their civic education curriculum to include the teachings of the Church. The recent addition to the team is a full-time Kenyan lawyer, Dorothy Ombajo. Christine remarks: “Christ the King office of human rights is one of the best human rights groups in Kenya. The people feel blessed having a lawyer who understands their problems. There has been a huge increase in people coming to the office, especially children, about rape, sodomy and being thrown out of school … I also feel great pride in our human rights team. My goal has been to plant the seeds. These people can change the world.” Christine Bodewes is aglow with joy because, through her ministry as a lawyer, she was able to harness the spirit of the civil law to promote human rights and serve the good of people, especially the poor.
The first reading of this Sunday’s liturgy (Ex 20:1-17) is also about the law – the divine law given through Moses. It is about the Decalogue – also called the Ten Commandments - the fundamental law that regulates the moral life of the people of Israel. This rule of life, an expression of Yahweh’s passionate love for his chosen people, is meant to deepen his covenantal relationship with them and protect their identity as a people consecrated to him alone. The purpose of the Ten Commandments is to establish a righteous relationship between God and his people, and between the various members of his people. The God who delivered his people from an oppressive slavery in Egypt had given them this moral code as an opportunity to love him and their neighbors, not just in words, but above all, in deeds.
Harold Buetow explains: “All associations of people need laws: for recourse, to bind people together, and to put into words and action what the group sees as not only putting forth their wisdom and their priorities, but also as showing a certain spirit. In today’s First Reading, we heard the Ten Commandments. As expressed law, the Ten Commandments were not the first code of ethics written. But this code is different from any other. It involves the reality of love. And unlike the other religions in the ancient Near East, the Hebrews knit closely together religious belief and moral belief. The Ten Commandments are the core of the law of Jewish Scriptures. They presume the special covenantal relationship between the living God and his people, and it is this that makes them timeless. The living God who first gave them would guide his people to a fuller understanding of their content and implications. That is clear from the fact that Jesus re-interprets them in his covenant (e.g. Mt 19:16-22; 5:21-48). The first three commandments provide direct regulations about people’s relations with their God. The last seven contribute essential elements of relations with other people – but with another very important difference. In the codes of the other Near Eastern peoples, violation constituted only a crime against one’s fellow human beings; in our Bible, it is a crime against God – an entirely new orientation.”
This Sunday’s Gospel episode about the cleansing of the Temple (Jn 2:13-25) by Jesus underlines the reality that true observance of the covenant Law necessitates obedience, not simply according to the letter, but above all, according to the spirit. The cult carried out in the Jerusalem Temple was extremely anomalous. The religious practices had degenerated into a scandalous commercialism and shameful market trafficking. Legal transactions in the name of religion which trampled the rights of the poor and amounted to desecration, were being sanctioned and encouraged by the Temple authorities. The powerful figure of the angry Jesus castigating the religious leaders and teachers of the Law for putting unjust demands on the people and for degrading the meaning of true religion makes us experience the intense, righteous indignation of God. Indeed, the passionate character of the liberating God and the integrity of his covenantal love would not tolerate abuse, injustice and indifference to the plight of the poor. Moreover, the God of freedom, who brought Israel from the bondage in Egypt, would not succumb to false worship.
The Law that promoted the covenant relationship with God and with one another had been warped and violated. But the compassionate God, full of mercy and ever faithful and true, did not turn away from his sinful people. He sent his Son Jesus Christ to restore and heal the broken covenantal relationship and to bring it to perfection. The defiant stance of Jesus against the Jewish authorities in the cleansing of the Temple and his prophetic words, “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up” (Jn 2:19) made possible the charges of religious treason that sealed his fate. From that moment on, the development of messianic events would irrevocably lead to his paschal destiny. In an astounding revelation of divine love, the new and everlasting covenant would be inaugurated by the sacrificial death of Jesus Christ on the cross and by his glorious rising to life. One characteristic of this new covenant in the blood of Christ is the “interiorization” of religion: the Law is no longer to be a code regulating external activity, but an inspiration working on the heart of man, under the influence of the spirit of God, - the spirit of Love - who gives us a “new heart”. Indeed, though the Law was given through Moses, grace and truth came through the incarnate Word of God, Jesus Christ (cf. Jn 1:16) - the ultimate Rule of Life.
PERSONAL REFLECTION: Jn 2:13-25
By Andy Ruperto
Senior Theology/Philosophy Major, Franciscan University, Steubenville, Ohio
Who is Jesus?
This Sunday’s gospel is one that sticks out especially in revealing the character of our Lord. How do we reconcile this event with our notion of our Lord? When we ask, “What was He like?” what can we say? This event leads us to more questions. What is the cause that inspires this divine wrath? What does it mean?
“He made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area …” In the many portrayals and images of our Lord, we usually see the “gentle” Jesus with lambs in his arms. But He was truly a man – strong and full of passion for His Father and His House. In the cleansing of the Temple, we see the reaction of Jesus to evil and its attempt to invade a place of holiness.
By cleansing the Temple area, Christ also shows divine authority! He shows Himself to be divine and the Son of God: “… stop making My Father’s House a market place.” Only one who is in a special relationship with the Father would be able to act the way He did.
We see the side of “tough love.” Jesus is love incarnate. Sometimes love and humility begin to fall into warm-fuzziness and spinelessness. Love and humility hold on to their true meaning here through this show of holy boldness. Jesus reveals strength and an overwhelming desire to defend and cherish the beloved, the good, and the holy.
How do we imitate the Lord in this way?
We find that we are called to be courageous. Christianity calls us to take a stand. In our age of relativity amidst a sea of information, we must plant our feet on solid ground and hold fast. We must be zealous and passionate for God and His House! So many attacks are made against our Mother Church. Are we ready to defend Her? Maybe we are not called to take up a whip, but we are called to defend the Church in our words, in conversation and encounters with people. We must be ready for different kinds of reactions. Jesus was misunderstood. Are we willing to act courageous in spite of being misunderstood? Are we willing to act boldly for the sake of God who has taken us as adopted children?
We must love and show reverence for the temple of God – our Churches, our family in the faith (God’s living temple), the tabernacles holding the Blessed Sacrament … We are sons and daughters of the Church. Do we take care of the Father’s House? God resides in a special way in the faithful when they are gathered as God’s people. He resides in His fullness in the Eucharist. These are pearls of our faith that we must not “throw to pigs!”
He also calls us to love Him with a contrite heart. He desires “mercy and not sacrifice.” We cannot fall into habitual ritual. Prayer cannot return to animal sacrifice or empty sacrifice. Jesus wants to renew us and give us hearts that worship in “spirit and truth.”
In our Lenten journey, we must let zeal enter our souls. Let us approach the sacraments with fervor! We must desire to rid ourselves of the evil within and let our bodies again be a living temple of God. This brings to mind the passage of the sower who sowed seed on different types of ground. Some of them fell on the ground and grew forth, but were choked by thorns. We must strive to remove the thorns that prevent the kingdom of God and the Word of God from flourishing within us.
Prayer
Come Holy Spirit, give us a spirit of fortitude and zeal for God. We pray that Jesus takes hold of our souls and purges all of the evil and greed – anything that prevents us from truly worshipping and praying with our hearts in our inner temples. Lord, take away the thorns that choke your Word from bearing fruit in our lives. Sacred Heart of Jesus, inspire us with passion for You! Set us on fire. We ask this in Your name Lord Jesus through the intercession of our Immaculate Mother Mary, all for the glory of God the Father. AMEN.
II. POINTS FOR THE EXAMINATION OF THE HEART
A. What is our attitude to the Ten Commandments given to us by God? Do we consider it merely as a moral code, or do we treasure it as a gift of covenantal love? What do we do personally to help us “interiorize” the spirit of the Ten Commandments?
B. How does the figure of “the angry Jesus” as depicted in the episode of the cleansing of the Temple impact us? What are the various elements and areas that need “cleansing” in our personal lives, in the community, in the family of nations, and in creation?
C. What is our response to Jesus Christ, who has ratified the new and everlasting covenant in his blood? How do we follow and reverence him as the total and ultimate Rule of Life? How do we incarnate the great commandment of love of God and neighbor that he had taught us by the very offering of his life?
III. PRAYING WITH THE WORD
Leader: Father, your commandments spring forth from your covenantal love and your saving will to consecrate us as your holy people. You have the words of everlasting life. In the sacrificial death of your Son Jesus Christ – the ultimate saving word you have spoken, you have radically revealed the depths and grandeur of your unfailing love for us. May we follow unreservedly your Son, the true and absolute Rule of Life. By the gift of his life, which brought forth the new and eternal covenant, cleanse us from all that impedes our wholehearted attachment to you, now and forever.
Assembly: Amen.
IV. INTERIORIZATION OF THE WORD
The following is the bread of the living Word that will nourish us throughout the week. Please memorize it.
“For I, the Lord, your God, bestow mercy down to the thousandth generation on the children of those who love me and keep my commandments.” (Ex 20:6)
V. TOWARDS LIFE TRANSFORMATION
A. ACTION PLAN: Pray for the conversion and enlightenment of those who disregard the commandments of God, either willfully or through ignorance. Study the incredibly enriching and inspiring chapters of the Catechism of the Catholic Church on the Ten Commandments. Contribute to the cleansing and rebuilding of God’s desecrated “temple” – today’s suffering people who are victims of crimes, violence, oppression, exploitation and injustice.
B. ACTION PLAN: To contemplate more intensely the commandments given to us by God and to thank him for the gift of the new covenant in Jesus Christ, make an effort to spend an hour in Eucharistic Adoration. Visit the PDDM WEB site (www.pddm.us) for the EUCHARISTIC ADORATION THROUGH THE LITURGICAL YEAR (Vol. 2, n. 17): A Weekly Pastoral Tool.
Prepared by Sr. Mary Margaret Tapang PDDM
PIAE DISCIPULAE DIVINI MAGISTRI
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