(Twenty-second Sunday of the Year (B): This homily was given on August 31, 1997 at St. Pius X Church, Westerly, R.I. by Fr. Raymond Suriani. Read Mark 7: 1-23.)

"The Pharisees: All show and no substance."

It’s all show and no substance.

In one line, that’s our Lord’s message to the Pharisees in today’s gospel story from Mark 7. These men come up to Jesus and say to him, "Why do your disciples not follow the tradition of our ancestors, but instead take food without purifying their hands?" Did the Pharisees say this because they were the ancestors of Mr. Clean and Miss Manners? No--for them it was not a question of personal hygiene or good etiquette, although they probably advocated both. They put this question to Jesus because ritual hand washing had an important religious significance to the Jewish people: it was supposed to be a sign of their desire to be washed clean their sins and to live in holiness. As it says in Psalm 24: Who can ascend the mountain of the Lord? Or who may stand in his holy place? He whose hands are sinless, whose heart is clean, who desires not what is vain, nor swears deceitfully to his neighbor. He shall receive a blessing from the Lord, a reward from God his savior.

Well, as we heard a few moments ago: in response to the Pharisees’ question, Jesus goes ballistic! Now this does not mean that Jesus approved of eating with dirty hands! (Boys and girls, when your parents tell you to wash your dirty hands before supper please do not tell them that Jesus says it’s okay!) In fact, there’s absolutely no reason to think that Jesus disapproved of this type of ritual cleansing. He understood it’s symbolic value. But what Jesus did disapprove of was people going through religious rituals and then totally neglecting the meaning behind the rituals! And this is why he criticizes the Pharisees so vehemently: for them the external act of washing their hands was much more important than the moral purity it was supposed to signify. And so Jesus says to them, in effect, "Gentlemen, for you it’s all show and no substance! You’re very concerned about the external practice of your religion, but at the very same time you’re totally neglecting the substance of your faith!" And that’s precisely the message of the Scripture passage he quotes to them from the prophet Isaiah: "This people pays me lip service, but their heart is far from me."

Unfortunately, my brothers and sisters, this Pharisaic attitude is alive and well in today’s world. That fact hit home with me last Monday when I picked up the Providence Journal and read the lead story: page 1--the very top of the page. The headline read, "Clinton hears pointed sermon." Apparently the previous day, the president and his wife had attended a church service on Martha’s Vineyard, and the Episcopal minister who gave the sermon spoke about forgiveness. And in the process he challenged people to forgive the man recently convicted for the Oklahoma City bombing. Then he went on to ask supporters of the death penalty to reconsider their position on that issue. (One footnote here: Catholics, with the proper qualifications, can either be for or against capital punishment in a given circumstance.) Incredibly, what the minister said during his sermon caused a major controversy! Almost everybody in the media picked up on it. Some reacted by saying, "How dare he address this issue from the pulpit! What arrogance! What audacity!" Gene Valicenti from channel 10 interviewed the minister on Tuesday night, and he attacked the poor man as if he had committed a major felony! One man from Connecticut who attended the service was quoted as saying, "I came to be filled with the Spirit of the Lord, not to be lectured to on a political subject." Well, this man obviously doesn’t pay attention when he prays the Lord’s Prayer--because "forgiveness" is not a political subject!! ("Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.") Forgiveness is part of the substance of the gospel of Jesus Christ!

You see, my brothers and sisters, this sermon last week on Martha’s Vineyard should not have shocked anybody-- because it dealt with a topic which is at the heart of the Christian faith--but the fact of the matter is: it did shock a great number of people! Why? Because many people today are just like the Pharisees of old: they want all the niceties of religion without the substance of their faith. They want a religion that makes them feel good, but doesn’t challenge them to change. The other day I heard a person say, "This minister’s sermon was too controversial." You mean Jesus Christ was not controversial? Please show me one page of the gospel where Jesus does not say something that caused a major controversy!

Someone once said that God’s truth, when properly taught, will comfort the afflicted, and it will afflict the comfortable. The Pharisees wanted comfort when they were afflicted, but they didn’t want to be afflicted in the comfort of their sin. The great saints of Church history wanted both. May all of us be like them.