Reflecting on the Word

By Dr. Karla J. Bellinger

Do you remember your most embarrassing moment? The time  you tripped and fell onstage during a play? How about the day you  threw up in biology class? 

Psychologists say that negative memory weighs heavily. Your  great-aunt can say all kinds of nice things about you, but you still  remember the day fifteen years ago when she said something critical.  If you have/had loving and patient parents, you still probably  remember the few times they absolutely blew up. If they were the  enraged-all-the-time types, you probably wouldn’t remember that at  all, for it was the norm. 

In today’s Gospel, Jesus gets mad. Really mad. Turning over the  tables in the temple must not have been his norm: all four Gospels  have an account of Jesus driving out the money-changers. Years  later, when his actions and his words were being recorded, they  remembered this moment of fury and every one of them wrote it  down. Jesus wanted better: “This is my Father’s house,” he cried.  “Make it right!”

Could Jesus be both sinless and angry? 

If we see someone mistreating a child, we get really hot inside.  We want better. If we are treated as an object—as nothing, as  worthless—fire burns within us. We want better. Moral theologians  tell us that emotions carry no sin in and of themselves. What we do  with our emotions—that is our moral responsibility. Injustice should make us angry. Indignation must move us to action. 

Jesus wanted better. My mom once said to me, “God takes the  first commandment very seriously.” When the Lord gave the Ten  Commandments to Moses, he said, “You shall have no other gods  besides me.” And meant it. 

Consider/Discuss 

  • When have you been angry about something that was not right? What  did you do about it? Did you wish later that you had done something  differently? How can we allow the Holy Spirit to direct our anger so that  we do and/or say the right things, even in a moment of fury? 
  • Jesus wanted his Father’s house to be a place of prayer, not a stinking  location of commerce. How do we safeguard reverence for places of  worship? How do we safeguard reverence for the people who frequent  those places of worship? How do the two sometimes conflict? 

Living and Praying with the Word 

Here in the middle of Lent, Jesus, you again plead to make things  right. You want this world to be just. You yourself experienced deep  emotion. You know human nature by sharing in it. So you know  that feelings can throw us off. You know what passion can do— positively and negatively. Help us to sort through all of that so that  we do the right thing in each circumstance.

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