Thursday.blog
The Catholic Calendar for Thursday, June 10, 2004
Thursday of the Tenth Week of Easter
Scripture from Wednesday’s Liturgy of the Word:
1 Kings 18:41-46
Psalm 65:10-13
Matthew 5:20-26
A reflection on today’s Sacred Scripture:
“It is better for you to lose one of your members. . .”
Let’s start by saying that I don’t think Jesus expected anyone to go to the extremes he suggests in this passage. The language he was using is a figure of speech called hyperbole in which the most extreme expression is used to emphasize the importance of what is being said. And what is being said here is one of the most important things in life.
Absolutely nothing should be allowed to come between a person and God. Nothing. Not one thing. God is the only eternal, permanent, meaningful thing in existence. Without God, life is purposeless, colorless, and dire. Without God, life is tasteless and all of our joys are as dust.
Too often we try to stuff up the empty spaces inside with created things. These things are good in themselves, very good indeed. They come as the beneficent gifts of a perfect creator--they cannot be anything but good. God blesses us with these goods.
But we are called to see past the gift to the giver. What Jesus tells us here is that when something gets in the way of seeing God, we should remove the obstacle. If our eye strays, we should bring it back into line, because no matter how beautiful a woman (or a man) she (or he) is not worth our soul and the vision of God. No matter how valuable and lovely a work of art, it cannot begin to capture the beauty of the beatific vision.
In this passage Jesus calls us to detachment from the things of the world. He calls us to mortification of the flesh so that we learn this detachment. Nothing whatsoever has nearly the same importance as our loving Father God, and we need to learn to order all things to their proper end--eternal life with our glorious God and Father.
- JuandelaCruz
(sriddle415 at yahoo dot com)
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