Salve, Regina, Mater Misericordiae.
From today's Gospel, we should not suspect that the Apostles would eat their meals without washing their hands,
as many of the saints who have commented on this passage from Scripture said.
They just didn't do it with the ostentation of the Pharisees and scribes.
For we know that all men, from all walks of life and from all traditions,
even the pagans, would wash their hands before sitting down to eat a meal.
And so we are not to think that the Apostles were unmanned people.
But what our Lord is pointing out to the Pharisees and scribes today,
they put more stock in the ritualistic purification,
than in real purification.
And so they showed themselves truly to be hypocrites,
or as St. Paul would describe them, as clanging symbols,
for the law of God was truly not in their heart.
And indeed, they seem to have been of bad will,
for they themselves seem to recognize this very fact.
For they do not accuse the Apostles of violating the law.
They accuse the Apostles of not following the tradition of the elders,
that is, not following the traditions we make up.
And so we too must always be on God,
not to follow the traditions of men,
but always to follow the doctrines of Christ.
For the doctrines of Christ truly call us to exercise charity.
And yet the Pharisees and scribes would do such things
that in the name of God they would refuse to obey the natural law,
which required them to take care of their parents
if they became old and elderly and sick.
And so they truly showed themselves not to be men,
not to be men after God, but to be men after themselves.
That is, they had fallen to the sin of pride,
and they had blinded themselves by that sin to the traditions of God.
And so when God came as man to pass on those two traditions,
to teach those traditions from the Father to mankind,
they were blind to the fact.
And ultimately, the reason for this is because of their lack of reverence.
They gave reverence to things that were not important,
and so when they were blind to the fact,
when he who was most important would come into the world,
they would not give him reverence.
And ultimately, by not doing so,
they did not even give themselves reverence,
nor people reverence,
because any time we exalt ourselves above the traditions of God
by following our own precepts,
our own way of piety,
our own ideas in matters of faith,
we do not even reverence ourselves
because we fall into a state of sin
and thereby jeopardize our eternal salvation
and so let us always and everywhere remind ourselves
that we are to show reverence,
but we are to show reverence in the manner that the apostles would,
in a simple way,
for the Lord came to teach the apostles
to live simply and humbly
and not, as it were, ostentationally,
like the Pharisees and the scribes,
who devised all these traditions
not to bring attentions to the truths that they were to preserve
until the Savior came into the world,
but to bring attentions,
and so let us seek a true piety,
a reverential piety,
that lives a simple life
and always and everywhere humbly thanks the Lord
for the wonderful things he has done.
For in today's church,
we see often this lack of reverence in many things.
We see it in the very evangelization that is taking part,
thinking that we can compromise some traditions of men
with the traditions of God,
using things,
that in and of themselves
are contrary to the divine faith
as evangelical tools,
most especially to attract the youth.
And so, we simply, as it were,
keep the youth in the sewer of the culture
that is dragging them down into the very depths of hell,
rather than to raise them up and out
of a cesspool of immorality
into the light of God's true church
and into the culture of true life.
And so, let us always show reverence.
Let us begin by showing reverence
to the divine things.
Often it is we see that we fail in these matters,
even in simple things,
when we treat the things of God in an irreverent manner,
that is, when we use them as jokes or in any other man.
And so, let us always be on God
to treat the things of God with true reverence,
not trying to compromise with the world,
living as the world does,
treating these things as if they were just mundane things,
not to always and everywhere be reverence.
And let us always be on God,
and let us never try to reach out to others
by taking the things of God
and putting them to immoral things,
attaching them to things of men,
to precepts of men,
thinking that we somehow can draw souls
out of the abyss of sin
into the light of God's grace
by doing such as the Pharisees and the scribes did.
And in their sin,
they became totally blind
as the Lord would point out to them
and constantly point out to them.
And ultimately,
when they would not accept,
even the witness of children,
the Lord would then in their declare,
this is why you will die in your sins.
And ultimately,
it was because they had no reverence
for the things of God.
They only had reverence
for the things that they were devising
and the means of piety that they thought
were the right way,
not according to the Lord.
And so, let us always and everywhere remember
that it is the Lord who judges things
and often things are not as we see them to be.
For the Pharisees and the scribes
try to impose,
imply that the apostles in this day
were somehow kind of crass and unhealthy men.
And yet, it was not the case.
They may have been rough men being fishermen,
but they were not crass men.
They were good men
and they were beginning to live
the simple life that the Lord was teaching them.
And so, let us always try
not to stay up with the sophisticated ways of the world,
which is simply a sophisticated way
of manifesting irreverence
towards the things of God
so that man may remember them.
But let us always live a simple life
doing the little things we are asked to do by the Lord
in a simple way,
in a humble way,
and most especially in a reverential way
that communicates to the world
our belief that the Son of Man
truly did come into this world
in order to sanctify us,
in order to claim us,
in order to draw us away from the traditions of men,
in order to establish us
in the traditions of God,
and ultimately to establish us
in his Father's house
for all eternity in heaven.
Amen.
Amen.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.