A True Plan of Life

Wednesday of the Twenty-eighth Week in Ordinary Time C-2

Entrance Antiphon Ps 130 (129):3‑4 If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, Lord, who could stand? But with you is found forgiveness, O God of Israel.

Collect May your grace, O Lord, we pray, at all times go before us and follow after and make us always determined to carry out good works. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Scripture today: Galatians 5: 18-25; Psalm 1; Luke 11:42-46

Jesus said, Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practised the latter without leaving the former undone. Woe to you Pharisees, because you love the most important seats in the synagogues and greetings in the market-places. Woe to you, because you are like unmarked graves, which men walk over without knowing it. One of the experts in the law answered him, Teacher, when you say these things, you insult us also. Jesus replied, And you experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them. (Luke 11:42-46)

A True Plan of Life There is a dominant thread in the strictures that our Lord directs against the religious leaders in our passage today. “Woe to you Pharisees, because you give God a tenth of your mint, rue and all other kinds of garden herbs, but you neglect justice and the love of God. You should have practised the latter without leaving the former undone.” Our Lord here is not criticizing them for performing faithfully these particular practices. The practice our Lord is commenting on here would seem to be one based on Leviticus 27: 30-32, which stipulated that “all tithes of the land, levied on the produce of the earth or the fruit of the trees, belong to Yahweh...” The Pharisees whom our Lord was addressing were punctilious in this observance, even perhaps to excess in care for detail. But our Lord does not criticize the practice itself — after all, as said, it appears to have been an application of Leviticus 27. We may regard the practices of the Pharisees mentioned here as being part of their plan of religious life, founded on their interpretation of, say, Leviticus. Broadly speaking, our Lord expected and in fact commended this in the Pharisees, for he says that they “should have practised these things.” That is to say, our Lord not only did not call into question such religious regulations (if adhered to in sincerity and good faith), but he expected that they be respected. Our Lord’s critique related not to such practices in themselves, but to the spirit in which they were fulfilled. It involved the neglect of what should have been the heart, soul and purpose of any such religious regime. Justice and the love of God were being left undone, and were being replaced by a self-centred and prideful religion. These practices ought directly to have served the flourishing in their lives of love for God and justice towards others. Instead, they were performed with ostentation, excess and with self-commendation. Their own actions were the object of their regard, and God and neighbour were on the margins.

Taking the point more broadly, and applying it to a wider setting, this particular observance of the Pharisees which our Lord actually commended can be taken as reminding us of the gamut of legitimate, recommended and authorized observances of religion. A concrete plan of spiritual life will involve a range of judicious and approved religious practices. Our Lord’s passing remark (“you should have practised the latter”) suggests, indeed, that he expects some definite regime of religious living in a person’s life. There should be what we may call a concrete plan of life which will involve specific steps to sustain and nourish the spirit of religion. This applies to the religious life of all of us. An unstructured, un-patterned, unregulated daily religious life is unrealistic and doomed to failure. It is man’s responsibility to practise his religion in the concrete. The practice of prayer will involve certain prayers, generally also at certain times. The practice of self-denial will involve concrete acts of self-denial, and if the spirit of self-denial is to grow, there will be included in one’s plan of life regular acts of self-denial. The practice of charity will include concrete acts of charity, and if the spirit of charity is to grow over the course of time, there will be a planned regime of acts of charity. Christ our Lord will commend such a plan of life, if it is subject to the discipline of the Church (as in, say, Lent) and prudent guidance. But its true and fundamental purpose must inform its constant practice. The specific things we do to live out our religious life must be performed with the purity of a heart that seeks union with God and the fulfilment of his will. In a word, we must have a plan of life that disciplines our life towards its true goal, and which makes practical our dreams and intentions of holiness. But we must beware of the trap into which these (though not all) Pharisees fell. Our plan of religious life must subserve the grand goal of a flourishing in our heart of the most perfect charity possible.

Our Lord was once asked which was the greatest commandment of the Law. The greatest and the first was, our Lord replied, that we love God with our whole being. The second was like it, that we love our neighbour as ourself. Our Lord would teach his disciples that his love for us was to be our model in loving our neighbour. Let us every day place love, the love of Christ, at the forefront of all we do, and at the forefront of our whole religious life.

(E.J.Tyler)

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A Second Reflection: (Galatians 5:18-25)

Our Daily Choice One often hears during political elections that the voters have a stark choice. Despite the claim, often there is not a stark choice at all. But whatever of political choices, there is a very stark choice before the Christian, and St Paul speaks of it in Galatians 5:18-25. The choice is between being led by the Spirit, or being led by self-indulgence. Many people do not see in the Christian life the stark choice that is involved. They think that you can have your cake and eat it: that you can have it both ways. St Ignatius in his famous Spiritual Exercises has a powerful Meditation on the Two Standards. There is the Standard of Christ and the Standard of Satan. Ignatius insists that one must make the choice between them. St Paul says that "When self-indulgence is at work the results are obvious.." Whereas "what the Spirit brings is very different." And so, he concludes, "Since the Spirit is our life, let us be directed by the Spirit."

Let us then every day make the choice again, and again. We must resolve to be led by the Spirit of Christ, which in effect means being guided constantly by the dictates of our conscience as enlightened by and immersed in the Revelation of Jesus Christ, as taught by the Church. The Holy Spirit, dwelling in our conscience, will bring "love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, trustfulness, gentleness and self-control." In a word, such a choice will bring life in abundance.

(E.J.Tyler)

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