PARISH NEWS

Beyond Liberation

Sometimes Matthew’s gospel is interpreted as liberating us from the “old rules”. Nothing could be further from the truth! Jesus insists on the importance of “the law and the prophets.” Certainly, Jesus calls us to go to the core of the Law, rather than the technicalities and fine print beloved of the Pharisees. He calls us to the spirit rather than the letter of the Law.

But addressing the spirit of the Law is at least as demanding as just ticking the boxes as the Pharisees were doing! Jesus calls us (Matt 5:17-37) beyond merely avoiding killing, adultery, theft and the other sins condemned in the Law of Moses. This is but the starting point for Christians. We are called to establish exactly what the commandments are asking of us, to discern and avoid what leads towards sinfulness and to be pro-actively good. 

Just as good habits of honesty, integrity, self-control and trustworthiness in small things, enables trust in big ones, so bad choices multiplied became bad habits; and bad habits lead to bad consequences. Anger, lust, untruthfulness, disrespecting others and other seemingly ordinary and innocuous thoughts and feelings can lead to things far more serious if we don’t face, work through, and overcome them.

Jesus does liberate us from the technicalities that the Pharisees hair-splitting understanding of  the law inflicted on the Jews. Even today we need to ask, “What is at the centre of this law? Is this building up God’s Kingdom?” But recognising that the core of the OT Law remains, we are freed not so much from as to. Freed to focus on Jesus teaching, freed to repent and remove our own failings and forgive those of others, freed to be pro-active in seeking out the poor and lost.

Deacon Mark Kelly