January 20, 2015
Tuesday, 2nd Week in Ordinary Time
1st Reading: Heb 6:10-20
Gospel: Mk 2:23-28
One Sabbath he was walking through grain fields. As his disciples walked along with him, they began to pick the heads of grain and crush them in their hands. Then the Pharisees said to Jesus, “Look! they are doing what is forbidden on the Sabbath!” And he said to them, “Have you never read what David did in his time of need, when he and his men were very hungry? He went into the house of God when Abiathar was High Priest and ate the bread of offering, which only the priests are allowed to eat, and he also gave some to the men who were with him.” Then Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is master even of the Sabbath.”
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the Assimilated Life Experience)
On a Sabbath day where work was strictly prohibited to enforce compliance with the commandment of keeping the Lord’s Day holy, Jesus’ disciples were picking the heads of grain and crushing them in their hands. To the scrutinizing eyes of the Pharisees, the disciples were already grinding grain and were therefore violating the Sabbath Law.
Jesus took exception to the strict interpretation of the Mosaic Law by invoking 1Samuel 21:2-7, a scripture passage showing how laws can be relaxed for the welfare of man. In this passage, the prohibition of eating food reserved for priests stipulated in Leviticus 24-9 was relaxed in order to accommodate David and his soldiers who were extremely hungry. Jesus argued further that the law is made for man and not man for the law.
Our interpretation of the Ten Commandments is not as stiff as that of the Jews. Sad to say, the same legalistic spirit still hounds us in the Church. Before I became a priest, I travelled to Manila and attended Mass in one of the churches there. My hands were full as I lined up for communion because I could not leave my things in the pew. When I stuck my tongue out to receive the sacred host, the old priest wouldn’t give me any. He told me: “follow the rules little boy!” He insisted that I should receive communion by the hand.
There are bigger stories to tell depicting abuse of authority and power in the parish. Some parishioners react by not going to church anymore. In the end they are hurting themselves and they only have themselves to blame for being onion-skinned. But if we consider that the abuse of authority by church personnel is the proximate cause of these self-inflicted hurts, we realize how important it is that the law should be observed to serve the welfare of parishioners and not the other way around.— Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM. Email: dan.delosangeles@gmail.com. Website:www.frdan.org.
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