Today, Jesus was teaching in a synagogue. It happened to be a Sabbath day, a day of no work. Jesus had already gotten a reputation for being loose when it came to observing the hundreds of rules and regulations about what could and could not be done on the Sabbath. Curing the sick was one of the things listed under “work” by the Scribes and Pharisees, something they interpreted as forbidden by the third commandment.
Jesus was teaching when a stooped woman showed up. He noticed her and was told she had been bent over for eighteen years, unable to stand erect. He called her over and healed here right then and there! Jealous of his popularity and threatened by his interpretation of the Law, the chief of the synagogue objected. It says that he was “indignant.” Like the Scribe and Pharisees in the earlier story, who came hoping that Jesus would do something so that they would have something against him, this synagogue chief and those with him were enraged by the actions Jesus. It was like fire and gasoline meeting on the synagogue platform that day!
Jesus knew what these “orthodoxy police” were up to, and in a rather in-your-face move, he healed her anyway, calling them “hypocrites.” These defenders of orthodoxy were so enraged by this bold challenge to their interpretation of tradition that they began to plot what they could do to stop him. Their plots led to Jesus’ death.
I have had similar experiences with our own local “orthodoxy police.” In 1983, I was asked by Archbishop Kelly to be pastor of our cathedral and to do something to revitalize it. The congregation had started dying in the 1950s and had dropped to about 110 members, mostly widows who lived in the high rises of downtown Louisville. In the fourteen years I was there, we grew to over 2,100 members by reaching out to “fallen away” Catholics. They came from everywhere - 67 zip codes in all! Well, you would think every Catholic in the diocese would be thrilled to see our dying cathedral parish come back to life. Many were, but some weren’t! I think it was more out of jealousy than anything, but the “orthodoxy police” came out of the woodwork “to see if they could find some reason to accuse us.” One of them, a schizophrenic, actually pulled a knife on me over a homily he didn’t like. Another one, an elderly priest, used to come into Mass after I had come down the isle, sit in a back pew and take notes during my homilies. He sent his notes to the apostolic delegate. He was also part of a group of “traditionalists” Catholics who published an anonymous (of course) “white paper” that circulated around the diocese. Never mind that most of their venom were lies and half-truths. Never mind that we had welcomed back hundreds of discouraged and inactive Catholics, some of whom had been gone, fifty years or more! Never mind that we did liturgy by the book, followed the marriage laws of the church and never challenged the dogmas of the church! Never mind that the Archbishop himself knew what we were doing and approved of it. They were very mean and jealous people and they were so cowardly that they would not put their names to their attacks.
The Church has been charged with teaching the message of truth and moral goodness, but when we are seduced into joining destructive and divisive groups, even those who do their character assassination while hiding behind the word “orthodoxy,” we are no better than the Taliban, Al-Queda or ISIS. Jesus “welcomed sinners and ate with them” as a way of bringing them to the truth. Jesus did not “crush busied reeds nor quench smoldering wicks,” but encouraged people in the truth. Jesus scolded James and John for wanting to “call down fire from heaven and burn up the snubbing Samaritans.” In fact, Jesus’ harshest words were not directed at people who failed on their path to God, but at the cruelty of religionists who were out to preserve what they considered to be the purity of religion. Blaise Paschal may have said it best when he wrote, Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.”
Finally,
let us never forget that it was a group of fanatic “religionists” who flew
planes into the World Trade Center a few years back, no doubt thinking they
were doing God a favor! As Pope Benedict said, “true religion builds bridges”
and “must never be used as an excuse for violence.” Pope Francis said this: “I
think we too are the people who, on the one hand, want to listen to Jesus, but
on the other hand, at times, like to find a stick to beat others with, to
condemn others. And Jesus has this message for us: mercy. I think — and I say
it with humility — that this is the Lord's most powerful message: mercy.”
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