Practical Ceremony
Jul 21: Friday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Back in May, we learned about the Council of Jerusalem, where the apostles debated whether Jewish laws needed to be applied to new Christians. Ultimately, they decided no, not necessarily, but some people continued to practice them anyway.
Part of that was cultural, but part of it was because, in ancient times, some of these were practical. Things like circumcision and the prohibition on eating pork prevented disease.
Because God made us as embodied souls, unlike the angels, He knew we would have physical as well as spiritual needs. Which is what today’s readings are all about.
Reading 1
Ex 11:10—12:14
Although Moses and Aaron performed various wonders in Pharaoh's presence, the LORD made Pharaoh obstinate, and he would not let the children of Israel leave his land.
The LORD said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, "This month shall stand at the head of your calendar; you shall reckon it the first month of the year. Tell the whole community of Israel: On the tenth of this month every one of your families must procure for itself a lamb, one apiece for each household. If a family is too small for a whole lamb, it shall join the nearest household in procuring one and shall share in the lamb in proportion to the number of persons who partake of it. The lamb must be a year-old male and without blemish. You may take it from either the sheep or the goats. You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month, and then, with the whole assembly of Israel present, it shall be slaughtered during the evening twilight. They shall take some of its blood and apply it to the two doorposts and the lintel of every house in which they partake of the lamb. That same night they shall eat its roasted flesh with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. It shall not be eaten raw or boiled, but roasted whole, with its head and shanks and inner organs. None of it must be kept beyond the next morning; whatever is left over in the morning shall be burned up.
"This is how you are to eat it: with your loins girt, sandals on your feet and your staff in hand, you shall eat like those who are in flight. It is the Passover of the LORD. For on this same night I will go through Egypt, striking down every first born of the land, both man and beast, and executing judgment on all the gods of Egypt—I, the LORD! But the blood will mark the houses where you are. Seeing the blood, I will pass over you; thus, when I strike the land of Egypt, no destructive blow will come upon you.
"This day shall be a memorial feast for you, which all your generations shall celebrate with pilgrimage to the LORD, as a perpetual institution."
The Passover Feast is something the Jewish people have celebrated for thousands of years, starting with the events described in Exodus.
But it wasn’t just a ceremony for the Israelites living in Egypt. They had to keep their shoes on at the dinner table, carry their walking stick, and gird their loins1 because they really were about to flee. Like, that night.
Passover is now a part of their cultural memory—fleeing oppressors in a foreign land, from Pharoah’s Egypt to Hitler’s Germany.
Responsorial Psalm
Ps 116:12-13, 15 and 16bc, 17-18
R. I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord.
How shall I make a return to the LORD
for all the good he has done for me?
The cup of salvation I will take up,
and I will call upon the name of the LORD.
R. I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord.
Precious in the eyes of the LORD
is the death of his faithful ones.
I am your servant, the son of your handmaid;
you have loosed my bonds.
R. I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord.
To you will I offer sacrifice of thanksgiving,
and I will call upon the name of the LORD.
My vows to the LORD I will pay
in the presence of all his people.
R. I will take the cup of salvation, and call on the name of the Lord.
The Psalmist wonders how he can possibly repay all the good God has done. He can’t, obviously, and neither can we. But what we can do is worship Him, in the way He has asked us to, from the Lord’s Prayer to the Mass itself.
Alleluia
Jn 10:27
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
My sheep hear my voice, says the Lord,
I know them, and they follow me.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Sometimes we don’t understand the things God is asking us to do, just as sheep don’t know why they’re being shepherded in a certain direction. But we trust that it’s the right thing.
Gospel
Mt 12:1-8
Jesus was going through a field of grain on the sabbath. His disciples were hungry and began to pick the heads of grain and eat them. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to him, "See, your disciples are doing what is unlawful to do on the sabbath."
He said to the them, "Have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry, how he went into the house of God and ate the bread of offering, which neither he nor his companions but only the priests could lawfully eat? Or have you not read in the law that on the sabbath the priests serving in the temple violate the sabbath and are innocent? I say to you, something greater than the temple is here. If you knew what this meant, I desire mercy, not sacrifice, you would not have condemned these innocent men. For the Son of Man is Lord of the sabbath."
The Pharisees are upset Jesus and the Apostles aren’t following the letter of the law (technically, they’re “harvesting” on the sabbath). Jesus has a few answers—for one thing, the priests have to work on the sabbath, so the law requires some people to work, right?
But first, he mentions David and his men, on the run from Saul, eating the Temple Bread.2 They did it for practical reasons—they had to eat!
In the modern church, we’re supposed to fast, briefly, before receiving communion. It’s a way of showing honor and respect to the Body of Christ.
However, if you have a genuine, practical reason that you can’t fast,3 an exception is made. God knows you don’t mean disrespect or sacrilege. He gave you this body, and expects you to take care of it.
Our actions don’t cause God to do anything. At the consecration, the priest asks Jesus to come down into the host. We’re not binding God to come at our whim.
Fasting isn’t a magic spell that forces Jesus to confer grace, so not fasting doesn’t prevent it, either. What it prevents is our own participation (again, if we do it capriciously and not for practical reasons).
The ritual, the Sabbath for the Jews and mass for us, is not what’s important to God. It’s conforming our will to His that He desires. As long as we do our best to follow that, the physical limitations of our earthly bodies (hunger, sickness, etc) are irrelevant.
For men:
For women:
Because your medication requires being taken with food and at a particular time is a common reason.