Word to the Wise
Friday, July 17, 2009 - Friday in the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time
[Exodus 11:10 - 12:14 and Matthew 12:1-8]This day shall be a memorial feast for you, which all your generations shall celebrate with pilgrimage to the Lord, as a perpetual institution.
At the celebration of the Seder Meal on Passover, a Jewish child asks why the celebration is taking place. This gives the opportunity to tell the story of the Exodus, a pivotal event in the history of God's dealings with the Chosen People. At the Last Supper, which was a passover meal, Jesus instituted a new covenant, but the roots of the event were in the Exodus event which is described in the first scripture today. It is a celebration of liberation from slavery in Egypt. Jesus reinterpreted the event to mean a liberation of a different kind, the forgiveness of sin. There is a lot more theology to all this than I have space for, but this gives us a foundation. Events like the "Exodus" stand like giants in history and are bigger than their physical description. Historians and theologians debate how the Hebrews made it across the Red Sea or the Reed Sea. The mechanics are part of the story but they are not the meaning of it. It is God's intervention on behalf of his Chosen People that is at the center of the story. If we can give time to celebrating important secular historical events (some of which we invest with religious meaning) such as the signing of the Declaration of Independence or Armistice Day, surely the events of God's history are worthy of our attention. The Exodus is part of our theological heritage and it is an event of liberation for all Christian believers and not only for Jewish faithful. AMEN
config
view
logs
3840.0 KB
82 ms
4
