GOSPEL POWER | JULY 16, 2021 | FRIDAY | Our Lady of Mount Carmel | 15th Week in Ordinary Time

Gospel: Mt 12: 1 – 8 (or Mt 12: 46 – 50)

At that time Jesus went through the grainfields on the sabbath; his disciples were hungry, and they began to pluck heads of grain and to eat. When the Pharisees saw it, they said to him, “Look, your disciples are doing what is not lawful to do on the sabbath.” He said to them, “Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? He entered the house of God and ate the bread of the Presence, which it was not lawful for him or his companions to eat, but only for the priests. Or have you not read in the law that on the sabbath the priests in the temple break the Sabbath and yet are guiltless? I tell you, something greater than the temple is here. But if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless. For the Son of Man is lord of the sabbath.”

Reflection

Jesus, who comes from God and knows the heart of God,  knows also the spirit that animates the laws given by God,  his Father. Laws that proceed from a compassionate God  cannot be other than channels of God’s compassion for His creatures.  When this spirit is ignored, the letter of the law is dead and does not  accomplish God’s purpose in promulgating it. Such is the Sabbath  law, which the opponents of Jesus frequently invoke to catch him in  error. But the Son of the Lawgiver is also the ultimate interpreter of  his Father’s compassionate will enshrined in those laws.

Prayer

Lord Jesus, help us to grasp the Father’s compassion that animates the  laws. May we strive to observe the laws faithfully without exacting others  to do likewise. Amen