The
Prison of Institutional Control
Pirates
attacked a remote town. They kidnapped some of its inhabitants
and burnt all of the houses. A father returned to the ruins. In his
house he found a charred body. He felt broken hearted at the death
of his only son and guilty that he had not been around to defend and
protect him. He had the charred remains cremated according to the
custom in their culture and put the ashes in a locket which he ever
after wore around his neck in memory of his son. Now, it so happened
that the body he found was not that of his son. His son had been kidnapped
and after some years escaped and went back to look for his father.
One night he found his father's house and knocked for entry. His father
asked who was knocking and he excitedly answered, "It is me,
your only son!" The old man shouted to him to go away. "You
are an evil person who has come here to torment an old man and maybe
to try to steal the inheritance of my son. My son is dead and his
ashes are here in this locket." He would not admit or entertain
his son, so sure was he that the ashes around his neck were those
of his son. His fixed idea prevented him from seeing the truth.
In
our Gospel today we have a similar kind of sad story. In the Babylonian
captivity the people felt that they had been abandoned by God. The
only explanation that they could think of was that they had been punished
for their failure to observe God's law. Out of this guilt there emerged
a school of Pharisees that posited salvation in a strict observance
of the law. The Pharisees became fanatical about the law and particularly
about the observance of the Sabbath. They developed a controlling
fundamentalism that was very much in opposition to the gracious freedom
that Jesus stood for. They were so caught up on the Sabbath rest that
they condemned the disciples of Jesus for plucking and eating ears
of corn as they passed through a corn field. Jesus would have none
of their nit-picking about trivialities and established the very clear
principal that the Sabbath and other institutions were made to help
people. Institutions should not become so important that people become
their servants.
Jesus
went further in challenging, indeed picking a deliberate fight with
the pharisees on the issue of doing good on the day of rest. He noticed
them watching him trying to find something of which to accuse him.
He asked the man with the shrivelled hand to stand in front and asked
the pharisees. "Is it permitted to do a good deed on the Sabbath
- or an evil one? To preserve life or to destroy it?" When they
remained silent he looked at them angrily, for he was deeply grieved
that they had closed their minds. Then he said to the man, "Stretch
out your hand" and his hand was perfectly restored.
It
is sad that some of the great injustices and acts of insensitivity
even today are perpetrated by good self-righteous people who are committed
to serving the institution. When upholding of laws and obsolete regulations
become more important than the needs of people they become instruments
of evil rather than of good. Very often an egotistical concern for
authority and power, obscure the truth which according to Jesus sets
us free.
Meditation
is a way of prayer in which we come before God without programs or
agendas or any kind of pre-conceived ideas. We have nothing to say,
are asking for nothing, and are hopefully a blank sheet on which the
Lord can write whatever he wants to write. When we are not locked
into concepts that come from our grief or guilt or desire to control,
we can hopefully become people who will respond to God's love by responding
to people, respecting but not being totally dominated by institutions
and laws.
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Taken
from Sundays
into Silence - A Pathway to Life. Copyright © 1998 by Claretian
Publications
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