Is it Caesar's or to God's

 

Once again in Mark 10:2-16, the Pharisees ask Jesus about divorce "to test" him and once again they misunderstand or misuse the scripture to justify their agenda. They hope their question will expose Jesus as dangerous to families, in light of his scandalous comments in prior encounters.

In typical fashion Jesus turns the table on the Pharisees away from their legal foundation for divorce to God's design for marriage. Because of the hardness of your hearts, he [Moses] wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, God made them [husband and wife] male and female. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. So they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together no human being must separate.

God is love. We are products of God’s love and handiwork, a small but unique part of God’s great ongoing work of art. Love cannot be governed by temporal laws of man any more than God can. We speak of marriage, a construct of civil law that we attempt to apply to God’s law, as a contract. But is it? 

I can remember studying what goes into the essential parts of a valid contract in a Business Law course a long time ago. For a contract to be valid there must be a valid offer and a valid acceptance of that offer; there must be an agreed upon exchange, or a quid pro quo, that is “something for something,” and the contract must detail specified “consideration,” a term used to affix a value exchange, usually money or equitable services rendered.

“God established a creation, a covenant bond, with humanity, with A-dam. Adam’s name is not only the name of an individual, the founding father of the human race, but it’s also the Hebrew word for humanity…The difference between covenant and contract, in the Old Testament and throughout scripture, is profound. Contractual relations usually exchange property, exchange goods and services, whereas covenants exchange persons. So when people enter into a covenant, they say, ‘I am yours and you are mine.’ So God uses the covenant to enter into a relationship with those whom he created in his own image: humanity and all human persons.” (Scott Hahn, Contract vs. Covenant, Outlook, February, 2002.)

So how do we apply a transactional agreement to love? We can’t. Love cannot be governed by man. No human can break the love between two people; it’s not theirs to break. Once again in our reading, Jesus refuses to be trapped by either the Pharisees or his disciples as he challenges the rules of men with the law of God. Each of the synoptic gospels cite some variation on Jesus’ take on separation of Church and state with the famous quote Render to Caesar that which is Caesar’s and to God that which is God’s. This phrase has profound resonance throughout scripture and God’s law based on his love and covenant with man. It has become widely quoted as a summary statement of the relationship between Christianity and secular authority that goes far beyond whether it was lawful for Jews to pay taxes to Caesar.

"We renew our faith in the word of the Lord which invites faithful families to this openness. It invites all those who want to share the prophecy of the covenant of man and woman, which generates life and reveals God!”(Pope Francis, Openness, 9-27-15, Philadelphia)

"I leave you with this question, for each one of you to respond to. In my home, do we yell, or do we speak with love and tenderness? This is a good way to recognize our love.

(Pope Francis, Patience, 9-26-15, NYC)