Is it Caesar's or God's

Once again the Pharisees  attempt to test Jesus (Mark10:2-16,) and ask him about divorce. 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 Socratic 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 treasured part of God’s great ongoing work of art. Love in all its manifestations, cannot be governed by any temporal law of man any more than God can. 

We  have been conditioned to speak of marriage, as a construct of civil law that conforms 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 "consideration," 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 created, a covenant bond, with humanity, in the person of Adam. 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 a covenant and contract, in the Old Testament and throughout scripture, is profound. Contractual relations are transactional, usually an exchange of property, 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)

Be Open

How often have we read about Jesus’ healing the sick; restoring speech to the impaired; sight to the blind, and hearing to the deaf? Somehow we have become jaded to Jesus’ ability to perform miracles. I recall having read somewhere that the great mystery of the incarnation of God in Jesus is not his divinity, after all God can do anything, but the true mystery is Jesus living his life fully human, just like us.

We spent most of this summer reading and discussing John’s Gospel. We almost sequentially delved into the mystical significance of the Bread of Life; the sharing of the Bread, and what becoming flesh in each of us means. Knowing the mystery of the Eucharist required that we suspend "belief" and palpably feel its meaning with our "gut," which after all's said and done defines faith for me.

We are told that striving to be in a “right relationship with God” is what being a Christian means and living the Word is what it's all about, right? But what does being in a right relationship with God really mean? Let’s close our eyes and picture how being in a right relationship "feels" for a minute. Note, I use the word “picture,” not “understand.” This may prompt our imagination and senses to feel the words as a palpable, sensory experience. For me being in a relationship with God is not anything I can describe with words. And here to help I invoke a line from Thomas Merton's prayer: The fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.  But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.  

You see, for me it's all about the feeling and calling all our senses into action.  "Albert Einstein said that the 'true measure of intelligence is not knowledge but imagination.' Being a disciple of Jesus Christ requires a great deal of imagination. It is not enough to simply attend to facts, rules and rituals and consider the job done. "  (St. Benedict Church Bulletin, August 29, 2021.)

God fully shared our humanity through Jesus as we through Jesus, fully share in God’s divinity. Anything less than that relationship with God would be reduced to being mere acquaintances. So, with this as our premise, we consider Mark 7:31-37 from the perspective of both the healer and one who is in need of healing. Do we ever think of ourselves as “healers”? Think of the times we listen, comfort and support one another.
    
What is required for us to be healed or the healer or both? Why do we resist the potential that resides within each of us? We hear but do not listen while remarkable things happen all the time, and we dismiss them as “coincidences.”

“Our ministering and supporting one another morph into the essence​ of our being and become who we are, as if they exist as an integral part of us. We become ever changed by their existence. Like an encrusted stone picking up moss while rolling down a hill, we are ever changed with each turn… And at the core is "love" God's love. I suppose, this is what's meant by becoming the Word. We need not speak of what we do, they describe us and speak quietly; and we give thanks for them.” (Ministries 7/28/15)