Tuesday in the Twelfth Week of Ordinary Time, June 27, 2023

Matthew 7, 6; 12-14

Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not give what is holy to dogs, or throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them underfoot, and turn and tear you to pieces.  Do to others whatever you would have them do to you. This is the Law and the Prophets. Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many. How narrow the gate and constricted the road that leads to life. And those who find it are few.”

“Do not give what is holy to dogs.”  Verse 6 seems out of place with what came before and what comes afterwards.  It possibly goes with the Lord’s later instructions to the Apostles about their first preaching mission. In this case, “the holy thing” (as the Greek says) might be the message to repent for the Kingdom of heaven has approached.  We could read it thus: “Go ye not into the way of the Gentiles, and into the city of the Samaritans enter ye not (Matthew 10, 5) . . . Do not give the holy thing to dogs.”  Or if this saying properly belongs to the Lord’s sayings after his Resurrection as he is telling his Apostles to go out to all the world to preach the Gospel, “the holy thing” could refer to Baptism or to the holy mysteries of the Mass.  indeed, one of the Church Fathers identified “the holy thing” as baptism.

Without context, it is difficult to know to what “the holy thing” refers.  We do know what the Lord has in mind when he speaks of “dogs”.  Though the Jewish Law does not explicitly list the dog as an unclean animal in the way the pig is, Old Testament references to dogs eating the flesh of the dead certainly taints the animal as unclean.  The “dog”, then, was anyone unclean, primarily meaning the Gentiles.  The Lord himself spoke of the Gentiles in this way: “It is not good to take the bread of the children, and to cast it to the dogs” (Matthew 15, 26).  Likewise, “or throw your pearls before swine”.  The Lord explains why the Apostles should not corrupt what is holy: “Lest they trample them underfoot, and turn and tear you to pieces.”  That is, the unholy people will ruin the holy things and also attack the ones who provide them.  We can understand this verse today in terms of the reception of Holy Communion by non-Catholics or by those who are not in the state of grace.  While perhaps sounding harsh, it is necessary to keep in mind the great holiness of the Lord’s Body and Blood and the great vileness of the state of a person who has maliciously cast away the grace that the Lord Jesus died on the Cross to give him.

“Do to others whatever you would have them do to you.”  This verse also seems unconnected from what has gone before.  One explanation for this seeming collection of unrelated sayings is that Matthew is working from his memory and he puts down only what he is sure of and does not try to cobble together a flow of speech he is not certain of.  While for the believer, the meaning this admonition seems apparent, others have criticized it for being impossible to carry out in real life.  They argue that if someone were to ask us to give them our house, we should do this if we follow this rule if it is what we would have them do for us if we asked.  However, the Lord gives the rule to those who believe in him and who therefore would not ask a neighbor to give them something that would ruin the neighbor.  Such behavior would, in fact, violate the commandment that we love our neighbors as ourselves.

“Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many.”  The “narrow gate” leads to life.  It is said to be a “gate” because it presents restrictions.  It is said to be “narrow” in that the restrictions are demanding.  The Lord says that the way to eternal life passes through a narrow gate, one side of the gate being the commandment to love God with all our heart, mind and soul.  The other side of the gate signifies the love of neighbor as oneself.  These “restrict” us from doing harm to our hopes for salvation by keeping us from worshipping false gods such as power, wealth, and sex and from doing harm to our neighbor.  The gate that leads to destruction is said to be broad because the two sides of the gate that leads to life have been torn down and only a wide hole in the fence remains. “Those who enter through it are many.”  Many people reject the narrow gate because they think themselves too good for any perceived abridgment on their imagined autonomy, and who want nothing more than to pursue the false gods that appeal to them.  It is the sin of Adam and Eve all over again, and leading to the same disaster.

“How narrow the gate and constricted the road that leads to life. And those who find it are few.”  The gate to life is not narrow to keep people out.  It is narrow to keep people in.  Those are few who find it because those are few who look for it.