The Word for Sunday: http://usccb.org/bible/readings/030815-third-sunday-lent.cfm
What
really pushes your buttons? What makes
you angry? What do I feel passionate
about that I would defend with all my might?
Maybe
these are questions that we don’t often consciously think about until that
moment comes when we’re pushed over the edge or when we can’t help but go into
a defensive posture. It might be a
certain political or religious opinion. Such passion is good but when it leads
to marked hostility and division, it’s simply gone too far. We will fight tooth and nail over our entrenched
sense of being right. Or it certainly
could be your children. If one of your
children is harmed or put in danger any good parent would immediately come to
their defense. Don’t stand between a
baby bear and mother bear!
In
our Gospel for this third Sunday of Lent we see Jesus in a rare display of
anger. It’s not the picture of Jesus we often see. His display of attack against the Pharisees
aside, a kind of war of words, the Jesus of the Gospels is far more a man of
mercy, compassion, forgiveness, healing, and a preacher of God’s word – a
prophet of the good news of God’s mercy. Yet, the anger Jesus displays in this
Gospel is not simply unfocused rage. It
is anger in the mode of the prophets of old who railed against injustice,
blasphemy, and idolatry.
Yet,
being as thoroughly Jewish as he was Jesus well knew the centrality of the
Temple to the ancient Jewish people.
Temple worship was at the heart of their religious identity and a physical
sign of their preeminent honor for Yahweh. All roads lead to Jerusalem and the
Temple mount was where God dwelled among his people. It was sacred ground and the rituals and laws
protecting it were absolute.
Our
first reading taken from the Book of Exodus 20 in the familiar Law of Sinai,
the Ten Commandments, we hear of that absolute Law given by God to a people who
were called to live in communion with one another. Here God offers these unique chosen people a
new and personal relationship with the true living God. Unlike the gods of the pagans who only
demanded worship, this living God invites and promises a new and unbroken
Covenant. These commands became a kind of blueprint for a new life with God and
our neighbor.
Within
the sacred ritual of the Temple, that covenant was forever remembered and it
became the place where the assembly would offer sacrifice on behalf of their
sins in a constant reminder of this eternal relationship with God. So what was
Jesus so fired-up about? The selling of
animals for sacrifice and the exchange of coins by travelers seeking to use
appropriate coins in the Temple was in and of itself benign. But the faith had
gone from a relational covenant with God to a crass and secular business
operation – the selling of animals and exchange of money within the Temple
itself. The sacredness and singular focus upon God had transformed to a
financial opportunity for the few who thought nothing of using the veneer of
religion for their gain.
Such
duplicity, moved from outside the Temple area right into the Temple itself
in
the court yard area, was a scandal and a sacrilege of Temple worship where
anything unclean was forbidden.
So,
Jesus rails against hypocrisy, dishonesty, and the mixing of pagan and sacred
practices. Like the prophets of old
Jesus “cleanses” the Temple of such filth:
“He made a whip out of cords and
drove them all out of the Temple area . . . and spilled the coins of the money
changers and overturned their tables . . . Take these out of here, and stop
making my Father’s house a marketplace.”
If that didn’t get the attention of the Temple authorities nothing
could.
“At this the Jews . . . said to him, ‘What
sign can you show us for doing this?” A question not out of line
actually. What gives you the authority
to throw these changers and animals out of here?
In
the prophetic mode Jesus makes a statement that at least on the surface was a
bit strange: “Destroy this temple and in
three days I will raise it up.”
When
they heard Jesus make such a claim the authorities no doubt were either shocked
or laughed sarcastically, likely both. But what about his inner circle? They knew the statement must have a deeper
spiritual meaning and John adds that Jesus was referring to his own body, an
illusion to the resurrection.
But
that claim became the focus of this event.
In the risen Lord, a new age has begun and the ancient Temple worship
was abolished. It is the person of
Christ Jesus we look to and in his Church, his Body, we are formed into the
very image of Christ himself. In the new
way which Jesus came to bring, in his singular sacrifice on the cross which now
replaced forever all the bloody sacrifices that had been offered at the Temple,
a new Covenant is established between God and humanity. While the original Covenant we hear of in the
first reading continues to be the heart of the Jewish faith and continues to
have direct relevance for our moral life, it is the new Covenant of love and
service towards all that is now established. God is Lord alone and love of
neighbor, Jew and Gentile alike, is the concrete expression of God’s mercy to
us.
Of
course, those who witnessed this bold action by Jesus had no comprehension of
such theology. They saw this as a rash
action which scholars have debated as the likely cause which pushed the Jewish
authorities over the edge and targeted Jesus for arrest. The Temple was the heart and soul of Jewish
worship and identity and Jesus was directly violating this in a brash public
display and threat.
As
we come into the midst of our Lenten journey we are invited to recognize not
only the reverence of persons as “temples” of the Spirit but also the Body of
the Church itself as a sign of the new Covenant which expands and fulfills the
old. The gathering of the people of God
week after week, the charitable works of the Church, the individual members,
the moral code of uncompromising fidelity to God’s law of love and mercy, all
become the new temple based in the life of the risen Lord no longer held fixed in one geographical location.
No
longer is the blood of animals sacrificed to appease a God of vengeance but now
a new Covenant from the blood of Jesus shed once for all is our hope. At each Eucharist we remember this new
relationship with God, signed, sealed and delivered for all.
As
we hear at each Mass when the wine is consecrated by the priest: “For this is the chalice of my blood. The
blood of the new and eternal covenant, which will be poured out for you and for
many, for the forgiveness of sins. Do
this in memory of me.”
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