MONDAY SEPTEMBER 9, 2024
MONDAY OF THE TWENTY THIRD WEEK OF THE ORDINARY TIME B
St Peter Claver, P. (Opt. Mem)
1 Corinthians 5:1-8
Luke 6:6- 11
DOING GOOD AT ALL TIMES AGAINST ALL ODDS
Living the good life in and with Jesus Christ is one of the tasks of every Christian. It means upholding a good and high morals, and extending same good without any inhibition to those we come in contact with. Goodness has no limits, neither can it be constained or limited by any law, habits or lifestyle. Goodness has to be shown at all times.
In the first reading, Saint Paul opens up publicly the scandalous life of a member of the Christian community in Corinth who was manifestly living with his stepmother in a life of concubinage. For Saint Paul, such sexual promiscuity can put the whole community in a very bad light. It gives the community a very bad name as condoning evil and harbouring sinfulness. St Paul cautions against such attitude and outrightly condemns such action placing a very strong judgement on this man. “Let him who has done this be removed from among you.”
Living the good life comes alife in our celebration, when we must stand pure, uncontaminated, holy and simple before the throne of God. As Saint Paul puts it, “Let us, therefore, celebrate the festival, not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. ” In other words, our goodness must show itself in high moral, shown by a change in attitude, a transformation of our old selves into a new renewed self. The struggle to be good is a journey we make in life. We are not through yet until we become or overcome all kinds of impurity and evil.
In the Gospel, Jesus was confronted by the Pharisees for doing good on the sabbath. They had already predicted or rather was watching him to know if he will act by healing the man with the withered hand on the sabbath.
Envy, jealousy and ill feelings can make one sometimes irrational. Again, legalistic approach to life can turn us into enemies of good. These two extremes were the faults of the Pharisees. That is, in concrete terms, goodness and being good can be blocked by envy, Ill feeling, jealousy and even by unnecessary laws.
The Pharisees tried to use the laws of the sabbath to stop Jesus from doing good. But Jesus asked them this vital questions, “I ask you, is it lawful on the sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to destroy it?” For this, they had no reply since goodness or doing good cannot be stopped by any law, neither can we destroy life on the sabbath but we must uphold and save life.
Goodness invariably aims at primarily saving life, upholding life and enhancing life. And there is no law against these, no inhibition or stumbling block must be entertained in showing these kinds of goodness. Jesus encourages us therefore to do good at all times, and never to be inhibited by any law, envy, jealousy or ill feeling.
God our Father, you are goodness itself, for you give life, protect life and sustains life. As Jesus healed the man with the withered hand, not minding the obstacles of the Pharisees, May we be good to other, and never allow envy, jealousy, ill feeling and unnecessary laws to stop us from doing good to other. Make us your messengers of goodness to the world. And may your goodness & mercy follow us all the days of our lives through Christ our Lord.
Fr Norbert Uchuno.
