Monday, January 19, 2004
2nd Week in Ordinary Time

1st Reading: 1S 15:16-23
Gospel: Mk 2:18-22

One day, when the disciples of John the Baptist and the Pharisees were fasting, some people asked Jesus, "Why is it that both the disciples of John and of the Pharisees fast, but yours do not?" Jesus answered, "How can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. But the day will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them and on that day they will fast.

No one sews a piece of new cloth on an old coat, because the new patch will shrink and tear away from the old cloth, making a worse tear. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins, for the wine would burst the skins and then both the wine and the skins would be lost. But new wine, new skins!"

Commentary

THERE is a great deal of "bridal spirituality" in the Old Testament: that is, relating to God as to one's spouse. To take just one example:
"You shall be called 'My delight is in her'
For the Lord delights in you
As a bridegroom rejoices over the bride
So shall your God rejoice over you." (Is 62:4,5)

Jesus may have been referring to such passages when he replied, "How can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?" Everything human is transient: joy doesn''t last forever. A day will come, he said, when they will not be rejoicing; on that day they can fast. But while joy is here be filled with it! Then it will stay around you a little longer. And when you have to move into sadness there will still be some effect, some coloring of that joy in you; your sadness will not be miserable but quiet and deep. But if your joy is measured and miserable, your sadness will be an even greater misery. Our joy and our sorrow take the measure of each other.

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