I know that we are steeped in a generation that loves to blame everyone and everything for something. We explain our behavior away with excuse after excuse from all kinds of outside influences. Well friends, this is not a new thing, the blame game has been going on since the very beginning when Adam told God that Eve made him eat the apple and we’ve been spiraling in it ever since! It’s time for a change in our thinking. In today’s gospel Jesus continues to address the religious leaders’ fixation on the rules and the regulations rather than on the heart of the matter. Jesus always wants us to focus on the purity of our hearts because that is where he resides and he wants his residence to be a safe and beautiful place for us to go and be loved. If there is clutter and dirt and filth and inhospitality, we will let those things take our attention away from his love, his mercy, his peace, his joy, his tenderness, his compassion, and his presence. I don’t know about you, but I want my heart to always remain open and hospitable to Jesus.
To get our hearts supple or squishy, as I love to say, we must begin with our minds and our thinking. What gets stuck in our head sinks down into our hearts and let’s face it, mind games are a rampant effort of the enemy’s to harden our hearts. The best way to change our thinking is to spend time in the Word, particularly the Gospels and the Psalms. Soaking in scripture tills the soil and gives us a greater capacity to host the Lord’s presence. Another way to purify our hearts is to spend time there. If we just look around and see the clutter and the mess, we will be more inclined to deal with it and hopefully get rid of it so that Jesus can be more at home. Otherwise, the filth will begin to ooze out and that is what Jesus talks about in today’s gospel. Things like, “evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, and folly”, can be what presents itself from within us if we don’t tend to our hearts and minds in a loving and holy way. Jesus wants his residence to be a safe and beautiful place for us to go and be loved. When we come at life from a place of security, beauty, and love, then we come at life with life itself and that is the opposite of being defiled. Jesus wants us to have the FULLNESS of life and to have it MORE.
Let’s tend our minds this morning so that we can begin to work on the roominess of our hearts. Let’s ooze goodness and love and grace and blessing rather than the list of ugly that Jesus mentions in today’s gospel. These things are decisions that we have a choice over when we stop blaming things from the outside in. We can change our world from the inside out and it is well with my soul.
Reading 1 GN 2:4B-9, 15-17
At the time when the LORD God made the earth and the heavens --
while as yet there was no field shrub on earth
and no grass of the field had sprouted,
for the LORD God had sent no rain upon the earth
and there was no man to till the soil,
but a stream was welling up out of the earth
and was watering all the surface of the ground --
the LORD God formed man out of the clay of the ground
and blew into his nostrils the breath of life,
and so man became a living being.
Then the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east,
and he placed there the man whom he had formed.
Out of the ground the LORD God made various trees grow
that were delightful to look at and good for food,
with the tree of life in the middle of the garden
and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
The LORD God then took the man
and settled him in the garden of Eden,
to cultivate and care for it.
The LORD God gave man this order:
"You are free to eat from any of the trees of the garden
except the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
From that tree you shall not eat;
the moment you eat from it you are surely doomed to die."
while as yet there was no field shrub on earth
and no grass of the field had sprouted,
for the LORD God had sent no rain upon the earth
and there was no man to till the soil,
but a stream was welling up out of the earth
and was watering all the surface of the ground --
the LORD God formed man out of the clay of the ground
and blew into his nostrils the breath of life,
and so man became a living being.
Then the LORD God planted a garden in Eden, in the east,
and he placed there the man whom he had formed.
Out of the ground the LORD God made various trees grow
that were delightful to look at and good for food,
with the tree of life in the middle of the garden
and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
The LORD God then took the man
and settled him in the garden of Eden,
to cultivate and care for it.
The LORD God gave man this order:
"You are free to eat from any of the trees of the garden
except the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
From that tree you shall not eat;
the moment you eat from it you are surely doomed to die."
Responsorial Psalm PS 104:1-2A, 27-28, 29BC-30
R. (1a) O bless the Lord, my soul!
Bless the LORD, O my soul!
O LORD, my God, you are great indeed!
You are clothed with majesty and glory,
robed in light as with a cloak.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul!
All creatures look to you
to give them food in due time.
When you give it to them, they gather it;
when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul!
If you take away their breath, they perish
and return to their dust.
When you send forth your spirit, they are created,
and you renew the face of the earth.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul!
Bless the LORD, O my soul!
O LORD, my God, you are great indeed!
You are clothed with majesty and glory,
robed in light as with a cloak.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul!
All creatures look to you
to give them food in due time.
When you give it to them, they gather it;
when you open your hand, they are filled with good things.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul!
If you take away their breath, they perish
and return to their dust.
When you send forth your spirit, they are created,
and you renew the face of the earth.
R. O bless the Lord, my soul!
Alleluia SEE JN 17:17B, 17A
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Your word, O Lord, is truth:
consecrate us in the truth.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Your word, O Lord, is truth:
consecrate us in the truth.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel MK 7:14-23
Jesus summoned the crowd again and said to them,
“Hear me, all of you, and understand.
Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person;
but the things that come out from within are what defile.”
When he got home away from the crowd
his disciples questioned him about the parable.
He said to them,
“Are even you likewise without understanding?
Do you not realize that everything
that goes into a person from outside cannot defile,
since it enters not the heart but the stomach
and passes out into the latrine?”
(Thus he declared all foods clean.)
“But what comes out of the man, that is what defiles him.
From within the man, from his heart,
come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder,
adultery, greed, malice, deceit,
licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly.
All these evils come from within and they defile.”
“Hear me, all of you, and understand.
Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person;
but the things that come out from within are what defile.”
When he got home away from the crowd
his disciples questioned him about the parable.
He said to them,
“Are even you likewise without understanding?
Do you not realize that everything
that goes into a person from outside cannot defile,
since it enters not the heart but the stomach
and passes out into the latrine?”
(Thus he declared all foods clean.)
“But what comes out of the man, that is what defiles him.
From within the man, from his heart,
come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder,
adultery, greed, malice, deceit,
licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly.
All these evils come from within and they defile.”
Beautiful blog today, Jen! It’s so so so true, that we have that control, and we need to be personally responsible for what resides in us. Today this hit me squarely between the eyes: “... let’s face it, mind games are a rampant effort of the enemy’s to harden our hearts...” I am in control of me. I can start my days filling my heart with goodness. Thank you!
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