Reverence in the Temple

Friday of the Thirty-third Week in Ordinary Time C-2

Entrance Antiphon Jer 29:11, 12, 14 The Lord said: I think thoughts of peace and not of affliction. You will call upon me, and I will answer you, and I will lead back your captives from every place.

Collect Grant us, we pray, O Lord our God, the constant gladness of being devoted to you, for it is full and lasting happiness to serve with constancy the author of all that is good. 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: Apocalypse 10:8-11; Psalm 118; Luke 19:45-48

Then Jesus entered the temple area and began driving out those who were selling. It is written, he said to them, 'My house will be a house of prayer'; but you have made it 'a den of robbers'. Every day he was teaching at the temple. But the chief priests, the teachers of the law and the leaders among the people were trying to kill him. Yet they could not find any way to do it, because all the people hung on his words. (Luke 19:45-48)

Reverence in the Temple In our modern period we tend to take holy places somewhat for granted. One of the striking things about England to a visitor is the vast number of venerable village and town churches there are across the country. The smallest villages have impressive and long-standing churches, which, sadly, are largely unfrequented. It bespeaks a past that was deeply Christian in culture, a culture that crumbled and was replaced by one that is profoundly secular. A religious and Christian substratum is still there and can provide the foundation for a new evangelization, but the phenomenon I wish to point to is the presence of the village, town and city church. From the tiny village church, beautiful, solid, inspiring, to the grand and imposing Westminster Abbey and Canterbury Cathedral, what would England look like without its churches? The church is a pivotal component of the character and history of the villages and towns of England, and in this respect, England is typical of the societies and cultures of mankind. It has been typical of a society that it has its temple, its place of prayer and worship, its holy place where its cultic leaders make contact with the divine on behalf of the people, and speak to the people on behalf of the divine. So it was with God’s chosen people. When finally the children of Israel had settled in the Promised Land, with David as king having established its political identity and his son Solomon now upon the throne, a great Temple was contemplated, planned and executed. It stood for centuries, and in a special sense was the dwelling place of Yahweh among his people. But the people were not faithful, and so it was that the divine presence withdrew. The country was sacked by the Babylonians, its Temple destroyed, and the people deported. When the people returned many decades later, the first great task was to rebuild the Temple. The Temple, the abode of the God of Israel, was the centre of the life of the nation. The grandest project of Herod the Great was a spectacular rebuilding of the Temple of Jerusalem.

How our Lord loved the Temple! It was the House of his heavenly Father. More than a millennium before, God spoke to Moses at the Burning Bush. He told Moses that where he stood was holy ground. Christ viewed the Temple of Jerusalem as holy ground. In our Gospel today, our Lord quotes the Scriptures which speak of the Temple being God’s House: “My House will be a house of prayer.” The Scriptures themselves had, therefore, taught that the God of Israel abode in his Temple, and Christ confirms this by his own word — “but you have made it a den of thieves!” We can imagine the anticipation with which our Lord entered the Temple of Jerusalem. He had come there as a youth of twelve, lingering in it after his mother and foster-father had gone. How it would have pained him to see disregard for the divine presence there! So it is in our Gospel passage today (Luke 19:45-48). Our Lord launches into the prophetic action of cleansing his Father’s House and imposing religious observance, prayer, teaching and decorum in this most holy place. “Jesus entered the temple area and began driving out those who were selling. It is written, he said to them, 'My house will be a house of prayer'; but you have made it 'a den of robbers'. Every day he was teaching at the temple.” A most obvious lesson for each of Christ’s faithful is the observance of a profound reverence in the church. In every Catholic church where the Blessed Sacrament is reserved, in an altogether distinctive and real sense, the church is the house of God. Christ abides there in his full human and divine reality, under the appearances of consecrated Bread. It is Jesus Christ who is there, and there is with him the Father and the Holy Spirit and doubtlessly the angels of God. But what of the reverence that should pervade our churches? I am afraid that all too often it is lacking, and in its place there is talk and distraction.

With what reverence ought we cease our conversation as we approach the door of the church and turn our hearts to God as we enter. With what reverence ought we make the sign of the cross, gaze in adoration towards the Tabernacle, genuflect, kneel to pray, and act as on holy ground. For the Catholic Christian, the member of Christ’s Catholic Church, the summit and source of religion is the holy Eucharist, because the Eucharist is Jesus. This is the pivotal element, and it is this which is the overwhelming factor defining the character and significance of the Catholic chapel, the parish church, the diocesan cathedral, and the greatest of the churches in, say, Rome. The church is the house of the living God because of the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament there. Let us all our lives be distinguished for reverence, that reverence which our Lord insists on in our Gospel passage today.

(E.J.Tyler)

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