July 02, 2016 Saturday, 13th Week in Ordinary Time1st Reading: Am 9: 11-15 Gospel: Mt 9:14–17
The disciples of John came to him with the question, “How is it that we and the Pharisees fast on many occasions, but not your disciples?”Jesus answered them, “How can you expect wedding guests to mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? Time will come when the bridegroom will be taken away from them, then they will fast.
“No one patches an old coat with a piece of unshrunken cloth, for the patch will shrink and tear an even bigger hole in the coat. Besides you don’t put new wine in old wineskins. If you do, the wineskins will burst and the wine be spilt. No, you put new wine in fresh skins; then both are preserved.”
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the Assimilated Life Experience)
If fasting is done for noble reasons, it results to significant physical and spiritual advantages. If done for a show, it is a waste of time. The purpose of fasting has evolved through the centuries. In the Old Testament tradition the purpose was threefold. First, as a token of sorrow (1 Samuel 31:13; 2 Samuel 1:12; 3:35); second, as a sign of repentance (see 1 Samuel 7:6); third, as aid to prayer in time of crisis (see 2 Samuel 12:16ff).
The Israelite cultic law, however, did not require any fast except on the Day of Atonement (Leviticus 16:29ff; 23:17ff; Numbers 29:7).
In the Pharisaic Judaism tradition, fasting developed into a highly esteemed pietistic exercise. Under this tradition, fasting promoted a gloomy and melancholy lifestyle enough to impress the public of one’s sorrow for sin. This was the context of the inquiry over the eating and drinking spree of the disciples. Jesus justified their minimal observance of fasting without intending to abolish the practice. He simply wanted to dissociate it from the brand of fasting of the Pharisees distinguished by ostentatious display of sorrow and grief.
In the tradition of Jesus fasting was meant to dispose oneself to live a joyful life in God’s grace. One fasts to build self-discipline and to attune his body to the higher needs of the spirit. This way he overcomes the power of evil in himself (Mark 9:29), handles major decisions as did the Apostles when they elected Barnabas and Paul at Antioch (Acts 13:2), and seeks God’s wisdom as when the Apostles did so before appointing the elders of the newly established churches of Asia (Acts 14:23).
Of the three traditions presented above, it is the tradition of Pharisaic Judaism that is inimical to the soul. It easily slips to hypocrisy. Under which tradition are you fasting? Do you fast at all? – (Atty.) Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM., MAPM., MMExM., REB., Email: dan.delosangeles@gmail.com.
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