Thursday February 23, 2017, 7th Week in
Ordinary Time
1st Reading: Sir. 5:1-8 Gospel: Mk 9:41–50
If anyone gives you a drink of water because you belong to Christ and bear his name, truly, I say to you, he will not go without reward. If anyone should cause one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble and sin, it would be better for him to be thrown into the sea with a great millstone around his neck.
If your hand makes you fall into sin, cut it off! It is better for you to enter life without a hand than with two hands to go to hell, to the fire that never goes out. And if your foot makes you fall into sin, cut it off! It is better for you to enter life without a foot than with both feet to be thrown into hell. And if your eye makes you fall into sin, tear it out! It is better for you to enter the kingdom of God with one eye than, keeping both eyes, to be thrown into hell where the worms that eat them never die, and the fire never goes out. For everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is a good thing; but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves and be at peace with one another.”
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the Assimilated Life Experience)
Today’s Gospel reading sounds so harsh. Fortunately for us, it is not to be taken literally. The harshness serves to underline the degree of the culpability of those who lead others to evil. It measures the seriousness that Jesus attaches to sin. St. Augustine wrote: “Cum dilectione hominum et odio vitiorum”, loosely translated as “God loves the sinner but hates the sin” (Letter 211). This may no longer be true when the sinner dedicates his life to the destruction of others, for in so doing he assumes the person of the devil.
We may not be committing very serious sins as to deserve mutilation and we may not be the type that leads others to sin as to deserve being thrown into the sea. But if we are neither leading anyone to God what makes us more deserving of heaven when we are supposed to be our brothers’ keepers? (Genesis 4:8-10). Heaven is for those who go beyond the four corners of their churches and prayer rooms. Said another way, performance of ritual as key to salvation is a religious fiction; it is valid only when pleasing to God. Since it is God’s pleasure that we love one another (John 13:34-35), lack of concern for others renders the rituals we perform detestable. In such a situation fiction yields to reality and our spirituality must be declared fake.
When fake spirituality becomes too notorious as to lead others to sin, Jesus’ proposal is unequivocal: we should be thrown into the sea. – (Atty.) Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM.
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