Friday in the 27th Week of Ordinary Time, October 7, 2022

The Feast of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary

Galatians 3, 7-14

Brothers and sisters: Realize that it is those who have faith who are children of Abraham. Scripture, which saw in advance that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, foretold the good news to Abraham, saying, Through you shall all the nations be blessed. Consequently, those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham who had faith. For all who depend on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, Cursed be everyone who does not persevere in doing all the things written in the book of the law. And that no one is justified before God by the law is clear, for the one who is righteous by faith will live. But the law does not depend on faith; rather, the one who does these things will live by them. Christ ransomed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, Cursed be everyone who hangs on a tree, that the blessing of Abraham might be extended to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.

The two main principles to keep in mind in order to understand St. Paul in his Letters  are 1) when he talks about “works” he is talking about specifically Jewish practices, not the works of charity our Lord commands us to perform, and without which faith is dead, as St. James teaches (James 2, 17); 2) Abraham was not a Jew and did not come under the jurisdiction of the Jewish Law because this came into being only long after he was dead: thus, he is the Father of believers, both Gentile and Jew, for he obeyed God and believed in his promises.  A third principle to keep in mind would be that in his Letters, Paul is often answering questions from his correspondents of which we are unaware.  He does this at the beginning of his Letter to the Romans, leading the modern reader into confusion even before he undertakes the main theme of his writing.

The first principle is in evidence in today’s First Reading: “Realize that it is those who have faith who are children of Abraham.”  For the Jews of his time, this could not be countenanced.  Abraham was the Father of the Jews alone.  In a merely biological sense this is true, but it is also not relevant.  “Through you shall all the nations be blessed.”  Paul is quoting Genesis 22, 18.  The whole verse reads, “And in your seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.”  His “seed”, not only biological but also those who are joined to him through their obedience to God: “Those who have faith are blessed along with Abraham who had faith.”  

“For all who depend on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, Cursed be everyone who does not persevere in doing all the things written in the book of the law.”  Here St. Paul quotes Deuteronomy 27, 26, at the very end of the Law: “Cursed be he that abides not in the words of this Law, and fulfills them not in work.”  After Moses pronounced those words, the people replied, “Amen”.  In this way they put themselves under the Law and subjected themselves to the threat of this curse.  But the Mosaic Law does not justify: it only prefigures.  It does not forgive sins and confer grace: only with the coming of Jesus Christ does humanity experience this.  The purpose of the Law was to prepare, not to carry out.  This is clear from the fact that the blood of oxen and goats does not forgive sins, but prefigures and prepared the people for the Sacrifice of Jesus, which does: “For it is impossible that with the blood of oxen and goats sin should be taken away” (Hebrews 10, 4).  “But the Law does not depend on faith; rather, the one who does these things will live by them.”  The Mosaic Law did not speak of faith at all.  It prepared the way for faith with its insistence on obedience to the Law, but it is faith that saves, not the Law.  Circumcision is immaterial to salvation as it is a mere surgical action, but belief in the Lord Jesus does, for it joins the human person to Almighty God.

“Christ ransomed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us.”  Paul makes an extraordinary statement here.  He does not say that Christ associates himself with a curse or comes under it, but he becomes a curse.  He eliminates the curse that compels the following of the Law in order to become a member of his people by taking on the curse by becoming the curse, and then dying.  With the curse dead, the hold of the Law on those who wish to be members of his people is gone.  The Law itself is transformed into a Law of love.  It is fulfilled.  It becomes what it was destined to be.  We can even think of a toddler running around and getting into messes growing rather suddenly (as it seems to us) into a beautiful groom or bride.  Jesus does this through taking on our sins on the Cross and fulfilling that part of the Law that says, “Cursed be everyone who hangs on a tree” (Deuteronomy 21, 23).  By eliminating the need to follow the Law in order to be a member of God’s people, “the blessing of Abraham [is] extended to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith.”  Faith, not possible without the grace won for us by Jesus, now makes it possible for the Gentiles to become members of God’s people, and so he saved.

Today we celebrate the victory of the Christian navies over the Moslems at the Battle of Lepanto, made possible by the graces obtained by the Virgin Mary through the many thousands of rosaries that there prayed for this purpose.  Through this great gift of the rosary to the human race, we pray to the Blessed Mother that we may be granted victory over sin.