Thursday in the Third Week of Ordinary Time, January 27, 2021

Mark 4, 21-25

Jesus said to his disciples, “Is a lamp brought in to be placed under a bushel basket or under a bed, and not to be placed on a lamp-stand? For there is nothing hidden except to be made visible; nothing is secret except to come to light. Anyone who has ears to hear ought to hear.” He also told them, “Take care what you hear. The measure with which you measure will be measured out to you, and still more will be given to you. To the one who has, more will be given; from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”

“Is a lamp brought in to be placed under a bushel basket or under a bed, and not to be placed on a lamp-stand?”  Lots of Christians shy away from public scrutiny of any kind.  They come to Mass and may even be seen in line for Confession, but will not volunteer for simple tasks at their parish.  While reasons may exist for this, there is a tendency to not want to get “involved”: a yes to helping put away chairs after a parish event might lead to being asked to do some more public or demanding work, and we do not want to be placed in a position where we would have to say no.  But this is thinking of ourselves, and not of what we are for as members of Christ.  After all, what are we for?  Our job is not to shine in secret but wherever the Lord deigns to place us.  And if we are “lamps” with whom the Lord shares his Light, then we should expect to be placed by him in dark places.  And every place is dark until the Christian enters it.  To be a Christian and to hide are two incompatible things.  Whether we are Poor Clares living in a cloistered world or a politician in a big city, we shine to those around us by virtue of our faith.  A lit lamp cannot help but to shine.  And a lit lamp that seeks to avoid shining is an unnatural and useless thing.  We shine because we are leant light by the Light, and because we are his his and the light we are leant is his, we allow him to place us where he wills.  It is our job and privilege to shine as brightly as we can, persevering in our faith, assisting others, and aiding in their conversion and strengthening.  We remember how the Lord said, “Unto whomsoever much is given, of him much shall be required: and to whom they have committed much, of him they will demand the more” (Luke 12, 48). He speaks of the greatest thing which can be given to a human being — the gift of faith.

“For there is nothing hidden except to be made visible; nothing is secret except to come to light.”  The Christian makes the truth visible.  That is, the one who believes in Christ shows the people of this world — those who dwell in the darkness of their selfishness — the Lord Jesus.  The eyes of those who live in darkness and know nothing else will go blind if they are overwhelmed by the Light himself, as we see in the case of St. Paul’s conversion.  But we who are the lights of the Light are given the work of accustoming their eyes and preparing them, by our own faith and sanctity, for the True Light which has come into the world.  The Lord does not intend to remain beyond their understanding but passionately desires us to help make him visible to those who cannot fully bear him now.  “Nothing is secret except to come to light.”  The Lord, born in a cave outside Bethlehem and raised in a tiny village in the hinterland, did not remain in these places.  Neither did he appear far beyond these places so that he might share the glory of the bringing of his Light to all the nations with us, his little lamps, whom he loves most dearly.

The Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, January 25, 2026

Matthew 4, 12–23

When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. He left Nazareth and went to live in Capernaum by the sea, in the region of Zebulun and Naphtali, that what had been said through Isaiah the prophet might be fulfilled: Land of Zebulun and land of Naphtali, the way to the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles, the people who sit in darkness have seen a great light, on those dwelling in a land overshadowed by death light has arisen. From that time on, Jesus began to preach and say, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.”  As he was walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon who is called Peter, and his brother Andrew, casting a net into the sea; they were fishermen. He said to them, “Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.” At once they left their nets and followed him. He walked along from there and saw two other brothers, James, the son of Zebedee, and his brother John. They were in a boat, with their father Zebedee, mending their nets. He called them, and immediately they left their boat and their father and followed him. He went around all of Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and curing every disease and illness among the people.

Im prying for everyone’s safety during this time of rough weather.

As St. Matthew tells it, the Lord Jesus began his ministry only after hearing that John the Baptist had been arrested.  This was his impression as one of the last called of the Apostles.  John the Apostle, who was with both Jesus and John the Baptist, remembered a brief period in which their ministries overlapped.  In his Gospel, he noted that at a time before John the Baptist was arrested, some of his disciples said to him, “Rabbi, he that was with you beyond the Jordan, to whom you gave testimony: behold, he baptizes and all men come to him” (John 3, 26).  It would seem that while Jesus had begun his preaching ministry, it was limited in scope until the arrest of John the Baptist, and with the exception of the miracle at the wedding in Cana, he was not yet performing miracles, at least in the open. 

“The people who sit in darkness have seen a great light, on those dwelling in a land overshadowed by death light has arisen.”  Isaiah was foreseeing two events, here.  The first involved the return of northern Israel to Judaism.  After the Assyrians conquered the northern kingdom of Israel, they largely depopulated the land, driving most of its inhabitants into exile.  They brought in Gentiles from other lands they had conquered to live there, and some of those who lived north of Israel eventually migrated down.  Not until a few hundred years later did the Jews in the south attempt to make the land Jewish again, and they did this through resettling it, but also by converting those already living there.  And so, for the people in the northern part of Israel, “a great light” dawned — they became children of the Covenant.  Secondly, this prophecy refers to the Lord, who was born to a family descended from migrants from the south.  These Jews were always looked upon by the Jewish leaders of Jerusalem as somehow second class, even as outsiders.  This explains some of their initial hostility to the Lord.  They did not enjoy criticism or a potential challenge to their power from anyone, let alone from a Jew who came from outside Judea, with his odd clothing and accent, his lack of scholarly education, and his suspect orthodoxy in matters of religion.  

The Lord’s message was a simple one: “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand.”  According to the Greek, this should read, “for the Kingdom of heaven has drawn near” or “has approached”.  The Kingdom has come to the people, for without grace they cannot come to it.  God so desires the human race to fill the everlasting hills (cf. Genesis 49, 26) with his loved ones that he comes down to us.  The condition for entering the Kingdom is repentance: sincere contrition for sin, the resolution never to sin again in any way, and the desire to make up for these sins — to make restitution and to do penance.  This making restitution is no small thing, to be put off as long as possible since it is inconvenient and humiliating, for it is when Zacchaeus the tax collector tells the Lord, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have wronged any man of any thing, I restore him fourfold” (Luke 19, 8), that Jesus says to him, “Salvation has come to this house.”

“Come after me, and I will make you fishers of men.” The Lord could have chosen to spread the message of the Kingdom alone, a solitary herald going through the world, but in his marvelous plan for our salvation he wills for those to be saved to be involved in their own saving, and in the saving of others. And all of us who are baptized are called to this work as “fishers of men” so that we who are already caught by him may be the means of catching others. It is a great work to do and a great privilege for us to do it.

Saturday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 24, 2026

Mark 3, 20-21

Jesus came with his disciples into the house. Again the crowd gathered, making it impossible for them even to eat. When his relatives heard of this they set out to seize him, for they said, “He is out of his mind.”

This little story is found only in the Gospel of St. Mark.  Scholars want to combine it with another story Mark relates for us a few verses further down in 3, 31-35, in which the Lord’s Mother and brethren came to him and could not see him because of the crowd.  On that occasion, the Lord taught that his true brethren were those who did the will of God.  

Since Mark refers to “the” house (Hebrew and Greek, unlike Latin, have the definite article), we can understand Peter’s house in Capernaum is meant.  Like others in that time and place, it would have featured a walled enclosure with a courtyard, and the house situated in the middle of it.  This would not have meant much room, and most if not all of the cooking would have been done outside.  The whole property seems to have been filled on this occasion since “the crowd gathered, making it impossible for them even to eat.”  The people had come to listen to the Lord, as evidenced by the fact that Mark does not tell us he cured anyone.  Now, the tense of the verb Mark uses here is that of the present, as in “Again the crowd is gathering.”  His use of the present denotes a continuous action, so from this we can see that the crowd regularly gathered in this way, every day.  From the fact that the main meal of the day was served in the mid afternoon, we can also see that the crowd persisted for some hours when it did gather: the Lord and the Apostles had no chance to eat at the proper time.

Down in Nazareth, some twenty miles away, his people heard of this and considered it a problem which they needed to solve: “When his relatives heard of this they set out to seize him.”  Who were these people?  As Mark tells the story, they are “his own”, or, literally, “the ones of him”, a Hebrew idiom which we see, for instance, in John 1, 11: “He [the Word] came unto his own: and his own received him not.”  “His own” could mean family, friends, relatives.  In our western culture, we exalt the individual, but in the culture of the ancient Middle East, the family, town, or region was primary, and a person was only a member of these.  He or she exemplified the virtues and other characteristics.  This might extend even to such things as dress and manner of dancing, as is on occasion still seen in Europe.  When “his own” determined from rumor or witness that one of “their own” reflected badly on them — “He is out of his mind” — they felt strongly that he had to be brought home.  Note that they would not have been thinking of the Lord’s well-being but of their own reputation among the Galilean towns, which was never very high.  We recall, for instance, how Nathanael remarked, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” (John 1, 45).

“He is out of his mind.”  The Greek text is tricky here.  The verb is ex-í-steh-mi, from which our word “ecstasy” comes.  The Greek word can mean “to astound”, “to amaze”, but it can also mean “to be insane”.  We do not have a parallel text for this verse in the other Gospels with which to compare it.  Other Evangelists use the word in other passages, though.  St. Matthew uses it to describe the general reaction of people to Jesus: “And all the multitudes were amazed, and said: Is not this the son of David?” (Matthew 12, 23)?   St. Luke quotes the two disciples on the way to Emmaus as telling their companion (the Lord, whom they do not recognize, “Certain women also of our company astounded us” with their witness of the empty tomb (Luke 24, 22).  Based on these examples, we could translate the verse as, “He is astounding [others].”  This would actually be fitting for Mark who, more than the other Evangelists, emphasizes the ironies to be found in the life and times of the Lord Jesus.  According to this idea, the Lord’s people come from Nazareth incensed that he is giving the town a bad name (which it had long before the Lord lived there), for he is astounding others (with his words and works).  We could even support this by quoting the Lord when he returns to Nazareth and voices the thoughts of the people there, “As great things as we have heard done in Capharnaum, do also here in your own country” (Luke 4, 23).  That is, “Astound us!”  The Fathers, though, understand the verb to mean “He is insane”, as it can be literally translated, “he is beside himself”.  Perhaps we can understand the verb in both senses: he is astounding others with his words and works, and he is insane for doing so.  The Venerable Bede comments: “For since they [his relatives] could not take in the depth of his wisdom, which they heard, they thought that He was speaking in a senseless way, wherefore the Gospel continues, ‘for they said, He is beside himself.’ ”  as if to say, It is so much easier to say that God is crazy than to say that I am.

Friday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 23, 2026

Mark 3, 13-19

Jesus went up the mountain and summoned those whom he wanted and they came to him. He appointed Twelve, whom he also named Apostles, that they might be with him and he might send them forth to preach and to have authority to drive out demons: He appointed the Twelve: Simon, whom he named Peter; James, son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James, whom he named Boanerges, that is, sons of thunder; Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James the son of Alphaeus; Thaddeus, Simon the Cananean, and Judas Iscariot who betrayed him.

“Jesus went up the mountain and summoned those whom he wanted and they came to him.”  This can be better translated: “Jesus ascended the mountain and summoned those whom he was desiring and they departed to him.”  The sense is that the Lord told his disciples to stay at the foot of the mountain while he mounted it by himself alone.  We learn from Luke 6:12 that “he went out into a mountain to pray: and he passed the whole night in the prayer of God”, and that in the morning of the next day he called his Apostles to him.  The calling of the Apostles from the midst of the disciples is presented to us as a ritual.  The Lord goes upon a height and prays.  In the morning, as the sun is rising, he calls out the names of those “whom he was desiring”.  From the mountain, he calls out each name, perhaps saying, “James, son of Zebedee, come up here, etc.”  each Apostle would have begun the climb of this broad and tall mountain (the upper reaches of which would have soared over seven thousand feet above the ground).  The climb would have made arduous work and taken some time.  It would have been much easier and faster if the Lord had descended the mountain and then summoned the Apostles by name.  But the ritual is impressive.  We can imagine the Lord’s voice, though perhaps not seeing him, echoing out from the summit, calling each name, pausing before calling the next, the summoned disciple then beginning the long climb.  And this is more than a calling up, as though the Lord wanted this disciple for a particular reason.  The Greek, “whom he was desiring” is in the imperfect tense.  Each of the called men was one whom he wanted as his own.  “They departed to him.”  The Greek verb here means more than that they “went” to him, but implies that they departed from someone or something in order to be with someone or something else.  These men are giving up their lives down below in order to be with Jesus in the heights in response to his specific summoning of them.

“He appointed Twelve, whom he also named Apostles.”  The Greek word translated here as “appointed” actually means “to do” or “to make” and is used in the Septuagint to translated the Hebrew ah-sah’, which is used to describe God’s creation of the universe in Genesis 1.  Thus, the Lord “made” them to be twelve, or “caused them to be” twelve.  He creates a unity here of these men struggling up the mountain to him.  They have him alone as their goal and as their Master.  We note their labor in coming to him, leaving all else behind, and in so doing see the exercise of their free will.  They want to be with him.  They are willing to leave all behind.  They are willing to make the climb.  By this time they have been with him at least a year and they have made their decision.  This is no impulse of theirs.  “Whom he also named Apostles”.  The Greek apostolos means “one who is sent”, “envoy”, or “ambassador”.  It is unclear whether the Lord told them that they were his “ambassadors” at that time.  This is an official position at a ruler’s court and would have been held only by the most trusted and competent people at a ruler’s disposal.  Their word is his word.  They are entrusted with missions in which they are to act on the ruler’s behalf.  This is something much more than a “disciple”, a “student”.  Humanly, we can see this action as a deliberate response by the Lord to the very recent accusation by the Pharisees that his “disciples” had broken the Sabbath Law.  The Lord had shown his rejection of their self-assumed place as Israel’s leaders and now invests twelve of his closest disciples with his authority.  The Lord further distinguishes himself from the Pharisees, who each had their own disciples, but did not dare call them their “envoys” or “ambassadors”.  Yet, the Lord does not act out of spite.  It while be a while yet before he sends them out on their first mission.  They have much to learn first.  

Thursday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 22, 2026

Mark 3, 7-12

Jesus withdrew toward the sea with his disciples. A large number of people followed from Galilee and from Judea. Hearing what he was doing, a large number of people came to him also from Jerusalem, from Idumea, from beyond the Jordan, and from the neighborhood of Tyre and Sidon. He told his disciples to have a boat ready for him because of the crowd, so that they would not crush him. He had cured many and, as a result, those who had diseases were pressing upon him to touch him. And whenever unclean spirits saw him they would fall down before him and shout, “You are the Son of God.” He warned them sternly not to make him known.

According to St. Mark, after the tumult with the Pharisees, to whom he revealed himself as the Forgiver of sins, the Lord of the Sabbath, and the Reviver of Israel, Jesus led his disciples back to the Sea of Galilee, perhaps near Capernaum.  It is worth noting that, according to the Gospels, most of his preaching and miracles took place in the string of towns that hugged the sea.  Using a map of the area as it was in Roman times, we can trace his movements on the sea’s western edge.  He did work in Judea too, but apparently only on the occasions when the Jews went up to Jerusalem for the holy days.  He also made a couple of excursions across the Jordan in the east and into Syrian territory to the north and west.  But by and large, at least according to the Gospels, he stuck to a small corner of Galilee.  This might seem odd for one who showed himself to be the Son of Man.  We might expect him to spend a great deal of time in Jerusalem.  Even his own Apostles wondered about this.  As St. Jude asked, during the Last Supper: “Lord, how is it that you will manifest yourself to us, and not to the world?” (John 14, 22).  The Lord’s answer was one the Apostles would only understand after the Holy Spirit came to them: “If any one love me, he will keep my word. And my Father will love him and we will come to him and will make our abode with him” (John 14, 23).  That is, the believer Carrie’s Christ within him wherever he goes and so the Lord “goes” to people he could not have reached during his brief lifetime on earth.  It is also true for us poor children of Eve that we are more easily converted by the disciple than by the Master because while the Master overwhelms us, we perceive the disciple to be more like us.  Also, the greatest miracle the Master performs is that of conversion.  The devoted love of the converted disciple for the Master moves us and makes more sense to most of us than the love of the Master, which is beyond our understanding.  The infinite love of our God for such as we leaves us gaping, but the seeing return of this love by one who experiences it leaves us craving to have this too.

“Hearing what he was doing, a large number of people came to him also from Jerusalem, from Idumea, from beyond the Jordan, and from the neighborhood of Tyre and Sidon.”  The Lord, by staying in the hinterland, draws all people to himself, and that is a sign for the Pharisees and the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem to consider.  In a way, this also answers Jude’s question: the Lord does reveal himself to the world, but he does not need to go out to it since it is very willing to go out to him.  Many came to him, motivated by the desire to regain their health.  These suffered from chronic ailments and crippling conditions, and they endured great difficulties in finding him and traveling to him.  But they went, knowing him to be their only hope.  This gives us food for thought.  To go to him now requires overcoming our inertia, our daily routines, and our pride, but he is to be found easily by us in the Holy Scriptures and in the tabernacles of our churches.  The sick yearned to touch him, even slightly, to be healed.  We are touched by him in the reading of the Scriptures and in prayer before the Sacrament.  It is the same One with the same love and the same power and eagerness to heal.

“And whenever unclean spirits saw him they would fall down before him and shout, ‘You are the Son of God.’  He warned them sternly not to make him known.”  The unclean spirits themselves wonder at his power, though they did not yet how true it was that he was the Son of God.  This too, provides food for thought.  Even the demons acclaimed his power while the Pharisees denied it.

Wednesday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 21, 2026

Mark 3, 1-6

Jesus entered the synagogue. There was a man there who had a withered hand. They watched Jesus closely to see if he would cure him on the sabbath so that they might accuse him. He said to the man with the withered hand, “Come up here before us.” Then he said to the Pharisees, “Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?” But they remained silent. Looking around at them with anger and grieved at their hardness of heart, Jesus said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He stretched it out and his hand was restored. The Pharisees went out and immediately took counsel with the Herodians against him to put him to death.

It seems in this reading that Mark is continuing a narrative he began with his telling how Jesus proclaimed himself to be the Lord of the Sabbath.  It would help to explain the end of the reading in which the Pharisees are so antagonized that they are willing to league themselves with the Herodians in order to destroy Jesus.  Just prior to today’s reading, the Pharisees, who had accused the Lord’s disciples of breaking the Sabbath, were reduced to silence by the Lord insisting that he was the Master of the Law rather than subject to it.  The Pharisees were aware of the miracles he had performed and could not argue against this, though they boiled within themselves.  Now, in today’s reading, the Lord and his disciples have crossed the grain field and entered a town, the name of which we are not told, though undoubtedly it was situated in Galilee.  Since it was the Sabbath, the Lord followed his custom of going to the synagogue in order to teach, commenting on the Law and the Prophets.  

“There was a man there who had a withered hand.”  Alternatives to “withered” include “parched” and “dried up”.  Evidently, he did not suffer from leprosy or he would not have been permitted inside.  The hand was useless though.  We see this verb used in Mark 11, 20: Jesus cursed the fig tree that had no figs though it was the season for them, and the tree is said to have “withered” as a result.  The direct style Mark employs here: “Jesus entered the synagogue. There was a man there who had a withered hand” makes it seem that the Lord came purposefully to this synagogue on this day specifically to cure this man of this condition.  “He said to the man with the withered hand, ‘Come up here before us.’ ”  Jesus wastes no time but addresses the man, who has presumably stood in the back among the crowd.  The Greek tells us that Jesus actually said, “Stand up in the middle.”  And then the Lord addressed the Pharisees, probably sitting in places of honor in the front: “Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?”  This might be better translated, “to save a life or to kill it”.  Now, this is a curious question.  Jesus equates the healing of the hand, which he clearly intends to do, with the saving of a life.  Conversely, he equates taking no action with “killing” this life.  The Pharisees do not know what he is asking, or sees his words as a trap, and they do not respond.  

“Looking around at them with anger and grieved at their hardness of heart.”  The English does not do justice to what Jesus did.  The Greek says that Jesus looked around “with wrath” or “passion”.  This is the same wrath with which he will condemn the wicked at the end of the world.  His furious reaction to the hardened hearts of the Pharisees may seem a little overblown when we consider the bare facts, but something more is going on here.  The man’s withered hand signifies Israel while the rest of the man signifies the Gentiles.  It is “withered”, as the fig tree will be withered because it has become dead in sin and faithlessness.  This is also signified by the hearts of the Pharisees themselves, which are “hardened” — withered and useless.  The Lord would restore life to the hand — to Israel — but the Pharisees would prevent him.  We can see from this what the Lord means when he equates the healing of the hand with “saving a life”, whereas not acting allows it to remain dead — “kills” it through inaction.  And just as the Lord turned with anger from the unrepentant Israel in the days before he suffered, so here he turns with wrath from the teachers so many in Israel preferred to him.  But the Lord continues to feel compassion for the man and he heals his hand.  The Lord does not need the Pharisees in his plan to save the world.  Their hatred for him renders them useless for this purpose.

“The Pharisees went out and immediately took counsel with the Herodians against him to put him to death.”  Ironically, the Pharisees answer the Lord’s question to them by going out to plan his Death even as he heals the man’s hand.  Their anger and envy have reached such a pitch that they become entirely irrational and they join with the detested Herodians in order to destroy him: they join with the forces that killed John the Baptist.  They would kill him themselves but they want political cover.  Of course, the miracle means nothing to them.  It often happens with us that we become so hardened in our opinions that any fact that contradicts them or does not support them becomes a personal attack that must be crushed.  People of that sort are very difficult to pray for, let alone to convert, and they may prove dangerous to believers.  But as the Lord died for them too, we pray and give good witness, striving to be our Lord’s faithful instruments in the redemption of the world.

Tuesday in the Second Week of Ordinary Time, January 20, 2026

Mark 2, 23-28

As Jesus wasy passing through a field of grain on the sabbath, his disciples began to make a path while picking the heads of grain. At this the Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” He said to them, “Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions were hungry? How he went into the house of God when Abiathar was high priest and ate the bread of offering that only the priests could lawfully eat, and shared it with his companions?” Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. That is why the Son of Man is Lord even of the Sabbath.”

Curiously, neither Matthew nor Mark tell exactly why the Pharisees were able to accuse the disciples here.  It is the Gentile Luke who tells us that they were rubbing the heads of the grain in their hands (cf. Luke 6, 1).  The Mosaic Law declared that food should be gathered and cooked on the day before the Sabbath because this could not be done on the Sabbath itself.  The rubbing of the grain heads constituted a preparation of food for eating.  The basis of this law is found in Exodus 16, 23-24: “This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Tomorrow is a day of solemn rest, a holy Sabbath to the Lord; bake what you will bake and boil what you will boil, and all that is left over lay by to be kept till the morning.’ So they laid it by till the morning, as Moses bade them; and it did not become foul.”  The keeping of the Sabbath became one of the chief identifying marks of the Jew and consequently the breaking of the Sabbath in any way amounted to a very serious offense.  The Pharisees would seem to have a good reason to report the actions of his disciples to the Lord.

Jesus does not excuse his disciples or tell the Pharisees that they must have seen wrongly.  Instead, he uses the occasion to announce a new order in the world.  Just as he has shown that he has the power to forgive sin, so he has power over the Sabbath.  That is, he, the Son of Man written of in the Prophets, is not a mere mortal but comes from the Father and is endowed with the power of the Father.  He himself is not bound by the laws he makes, and can alter them at will.  No Pharisee would dare claim such power for himself, but no Pharisee was casting out demons, curing the sick, and forgiving sins.  

“Have you never read what David did when he was in need and he and his companions were hungry?”  While his miracles backed up his claim to be the Forgiver of sins and the Lord of the Sabbath, the Lord does refer back to the Scriptures for the benefit of the Pharisees.  In 1 Samuel 21, 1-6, King David is fleeing from his son Absalom, who has rebelled against him.  David and his followers come to Abimelech the Priest and ask for bread.  He has none but the loaves that are placed on the altar of God.  Since David and his men are ritually pure, Abimelech allows them to eat these loaves, as there are no others.  The priest alters the Law on his own account for David’s sake.  If Abimelech, who made no claims of divine authority and performed no miracles, could do this, then certainly Jesus could.  The Pharisees listen to him but do not reply.  Certainly they murmured among themselves, but they had no answer to offer, nothing with which to contest his words.  

Jesus declares, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.”  He teaches us that the purpose of the Law is the salvation of the human race.  Previously, kings had made laws in order to show their power.  As he would later remind his disciples, “You know that the princes of the Gentiles lord it over them; and that they that are the greater, exercise power upon them” (Matthew 20, 25).  But God makes his Law to safeguard his people.  He makes a “narrow way” (cf. Matthew 7, 13) for us so that we might have the consolation of two walls or rails to feel as we go along to him.