Difficult Laws
Aug 16: Friday of the Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Often, the First Reading is difficult for moderns to accept, while we find the Gospel more comforting. Today is kind of the reverse, with a promise of reconciliation and forgiveness in the the reading from Ezekiel, while Jesus gives us a very strict understanding over divorce.
Reading 1
Ez 16:59-63
Thus says the LORD: I will deal with you according to what you have done, you who despised your oath, breaking a covenant. Yet I will remember the covenant I made with you when you were a girl, and I will set up an everlasting covenant with you. Then you shall remember your conduct and be ashamed when I take your sisters, those older and younger than you, and give them to you as daughters, even though I am not bound by my covenant with you. For I will re-establish my covenant with you, that you may know that I am the LORD, that you may remember and be covered with confusion, and that you may be utterly silenced for shame when I pardon you for all you have done, says the Lord GOD.
The “older sisters” refer to places like Sodom and Gomora—Gentile cities that existed before God made His covenant with Abraham, yet were still expected to worship God and follow the natural law. The “young sisters” are nations like Assyria, who came about later, and were able to conquer Israel at the time of Ezekiel’s writing.
Here, God promises, despite Israel’s shameful conduct, to reunite the nation and bring in all nations together, as well.
Responsorial Psalm
Isaiah 12:2-3, 4bcd, 5-6
R. (1c) You have turned from your anger.
God indeed is my savior;
I am confident and unafraid.
My strength and my courage is the LORD,
and he has been my savior.
With joy you will draw water
at the fountain of salvation.
R. You have turned from your anger.
Give thanks to the LORD, acclaim his name;
among the nations make known his deeds,
proclaim how exalted is his name.
R. You have turned from your anger.
Sing praise to the LORD for his glorious achievement;
let this be known throughout all the earth.
Shout with exultation, O city of Zion,
for great in your midst
is the Holy One of Israel!
R. You have turned from your anger.
Reuniting Israel and bringing all nations together seems like an impossible task. But Nothing is impossible for God. And so, in confident faith, we sing praise for miracles that have not yet happened.
Alleluia
See 1 Thes 2:13
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Receive the word of God, not as the word of men,
but, as it truly is, the word of God.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
This one is pretty self-explanatory. Which is pretty unusual for Paul, to be honest. Usually, he writes stuff like this—
Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and God of all encouragement, who encourages us in our every affliction, so that we may be able to encourage those who are in any affliction with the encouragement with which we ourselves are encouraged by God. For as Christ’s sufferings overflow to us, so through Christ* does our encouragement also overflow. If we are afflicted, it is for your encouragement and salvation; if we are encouraged, it is for your encouragement, which enables you to endure the same sufferings that we suffer.
Gospel
Mt 19:3-12
Some Pharisees approached Jesus, and tested him, saying, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause whatever?"
He said in reply, "Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator made them male and female and said, For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, man must not separate."
They said to him, "Then why did Moses command that the man give the woman a bill of divorce and dismiss her?"
He said to them, "Because of the hardness of your hearts Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. I say to you, whoever divorces his wife (unless the marriage is unlawful) and marries another commits adultery."
His disciples said to him, "If that is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry."
He answered, "Not all can accept this word, but only those to whom that is granted. Some are incapable of marriage because they were born so; some, because they were made so by others; some, because they have renounced marriage for the sake of the Kingdom of heaven. Whoever can accept this ought to accept it."
This passage is largely we get the Church’s teachings on marriage. As Ross Douthat explains in To Change the Church, the reason the Church is so rigid on these positions is that they come from Jesus himself.
The Old Testament contains 613 laws, many of which are hard to follow. But even then, they couldn’t cover every situation and every exception.
That’s why Jesus himself pointed to two laws1 as the most important—“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength,” and “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
Everything else is details. If we are truly following these, we know we can be confident we’re doing the right thing.