How easy it is to use religion and religious discourse to dominate and manipulate others!

 
Reading: Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to. Matthew 23:13.
 
Good morning, happy Monday, and many blessings my dear family.
 
Today’s Gospel (Matthew 23:13-23) is really a “downer!” I I read the text slowly, more than once, letting myself be struck by the force of these words of Jesus. I try to imagine him getting so angry as I look at his audience. t is the passage where Jesus is berating the scribes and the Pharisees. He is accusing them of being hypocrites. They act holy but often take advantage of those who have so much less than they do! Their actions do not always exemplify what they preach.

The temptation of setting ourselves as judges of others, locking people out of the kingdom of heaven is always there, even nowadays. How do I look at people in difficult situations - the divorced and remarried, former prisoners, sex offenders, drug addicts? I let Jesus challenge what he calls my hypocrisy, my ease to decide who is right and wrong, who deserves to see God and who does not.
 
Jesus accuses the scribes and Pharisees of rationalizing their selfishness by appealing to a higher law, even the law of God himself. I read these hard words of Jesus with humility and ask for an open and transparent heart.
 
Probably the only people who managed to disturb Jesus deeply and make him utter really hard words were those he considered hypocrites, those who were more interested in the outer appearance than in the inner value.
 
How easy it is to use religion and religious discourse to dominate and manipulate others! We see it happen under our own eyes all the time. Many have used and still use religion to justify all sorts of actions and attitudes that are clearly contrary to what religion stands for. How easy it then becomes to condemn religion and all religious people outright. I ask for the wisdom and the passion that I see in Jesus, as he tackles such thorny issues.
 
The phrase ‘blind guides’ is a warning to authority figures in the Christian church. In his life and death Jesus protests against all forms of domination in the name of religion. He gives us eyes to look on God and then to act rightly. This is what prayer means. I pray for the community with which I worship; may we never confuse the beautiful things we have or do with their source, but may we grown together in humble service of God.
 
I would guess that at times, all of us have a “Pharisee” within us! Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we always “practiced what we preached?” However, the reality is that, at times, we fail to do this. In a way, this can be a good thing! Knowing how we fail at times may enable us to be more understanding and compassionate when others fail. We are human after all! May we pray for the grace to forgive ourselves when we fail!
 
Blessings
 
Fr. Luis+