Thursday in the Third Week of Ordinary Time, January 28, 2021

The Feast of St. Thomas Aquinas 

Hebrews 10:19-25

Brothers and sisters: Since through the Blood of Jesus we have confidence of entrance into the sanctuary by the new and living way he opened for us through the veil, that is, his Flesh, and since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us approach with a sincere heart and in absolute trust, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed in pure water. Let us hold unwaveringly to our confession that gives us hope, for he who made the promise is trustworthy. We must consider how to rouse one another to love and good works. We should not stay away from our assembly, as is the custom of some, but encourage one another, and this all the more as you see the day drawing near.

“Since through the Blood of Jesus we have confidence of entrance into the sanctuary.”  While the Blood of Jesus, shed on the Cross for us, makes our salvation possible, it also provides us a tangible reason to hope for it.  St. Paul identifies heaven, the place of our salvation, with the “sanctuary” of a temple, particularly with that of the Temple in Jerusalem.  This Temple was divided into sections where people would go depending upon who they were.  For instance, there was a court for women and children.  Men could not normally go there, but neither could women and children enter the men’s court. There was also a certain court beyond which the Gentiles could not go.  Only the priests could enter the sanctuary, and only the high priest could enter the Holy of Holies beside it.  A non-priest could never hope to enter the sanctuary or the Holy of Holies.  But Paul has made it clear that, in Baptism, in the Blood of Jesus, we are made a priestly people and so we have the privilege of entering not only the sanctuary but even the Holy of Holies.  The way to the Holy of Holies went through the veil that hung between it and the sanctuary — a veil that was torn from top to bottom at the moment of the sacrificial Death of the Lord Jesus (cf. Matthew 27, 51).  “By the new and living way he opened for us through the veil, that is, his Flesh.”  This “way” is his Church.  Paul identifies the veil of the Holy of Holies with the Flesh of the Lord, which is fitting because the veil was the exterior of the Holy of Holies, “veiling” the divine within, just as the Flesh of the Lord veiled the Lord’s divinity.  With his Death, the “veil” is torn, revealing his divinity, which even the Roman centurion acknowledged: “Truly, this was the Son of God” (Matthew 27, 54).  This is signified by the tearing of the veil in the Temple.  “Through his Flesh”, then, we have salvation.  

“Since we have a great priest over the house of God, let us approach with a sincere heart and in absolute trust.”  Jesus is the “great” priest, not the successor to wicked Caiphas as “high priest”, but “great” in the sense of offering the Sacrifice of himself for us.  He is the great priest of the Church, the true “house of God”, and in our knowledge of this we approach the Holy of Holies, heaven, in solemn procession, girded with “a sincere heart” and “absolute trust”.  After all, what has he left undone for us?  “With our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed in pure water.”  That is, we are cleansed heart and mind, body and soul, in Baptism.  Washed in this way, we are prepared to enter this most holy of places.

“Let us hold unwaveringly to our confession that gives us hope, for he who made the promise is trustworthy.”  Just as the Lord showed his trustworthiness with absolutely clarity in his Death for us, so we cling without reservation to our Faith, which he revealed to us and in which we were baptized.  “We must consider how to rouse one another to love and good works.”  We do not enter heaven each of us alone, as in the case of the high priest who entered the earthly Holy of Holies alone.  We assist one another with good example, prayers, and with urging to do good works and to live a holy life in imitation of the Lord Jesus.  “We should not stay away from our assembly, as is the custom of some.”  At the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, to which all believers are invited, we worship our God as he has commanded us.  At the same time, we see one another there and recognize that God has purposely put us believers together in the world so that we might help each other on the road to salvation.  “But encourage one another, and this all the more as you see the day drawing near.”  We encourage one another to come to Holy Mass in order to worship God and to draw solace from the presence of others in our fellowship.  We do this “all the more” — with greater zeal — as we see that the passing of each day draws us ever nearer the great day of the second coming of the Lord Jesus.  Paul continually speaks to us in the plural.  He does not say, I have such a great High Priest, or You (singular) have such a great High Priest, but that We have such a great High Priest, and he laid down his life for us all.  Therefore we work together so that we may fill the true Holy of Holies with our souls.