Every day he was teaching in the temple area
21 NOVEMBER (Lk 19,45-48)
The true prophets of God are always engaged in the purification of the cult. A holy, true, right cult, testifies and reveals a holy, right and straightheart. An immoral cult, since it is only made of appearance, manifests the disorder of the heart. This worship is not pleasing to the Lord.
Hear the word of the Lord, princes of Sodom! Listen to the instruction of our God, people of Gomorrah! What care I for the number of your sacrifices? says the Lord. I have had enough of whole-burnt rams and fat of fatlings; In the blood of calves, lambs and goats I find no pleasure. When you come in to visit me, who asks these things of you? Trample my courts no more! Bring no more worthless offerings; your incense is loathsome to me. New moon and Sabbath, calling of assemblies, octaves with wickedness: these I cannot bear. Your new moons and festivals I detest; they weigh me down, I tire of the load. When you spread out your hands, I close my eyes to you; Though you pray the more, I will not listen. Your hands are full of blood! Wash yourselves clean! Put away your misdeeds from before my eyes; cease doing evil; learn to do good. Make justice your aim: redress the wronged, hear the orphan’s plea, defend the widow. Come now, let us set things right, says the Lord: Though your sins be like scarlet, they may become white as snow; Though they be crimson red, they may become white as wool. If you are willing, and obey, you shall eat the good things of the land; But if you refuse and resist, the sword shall consume you: for the mouth of the Lord has spoken!” (Is 1,10-20).
Jesus wants his Father’s house to be the house of the Word, of teaching and of training. Both the house in which resonates in a stable and perennialway the singing of God’s will. Today, we have to make the Church the home of the singing of the Gospel, of the truth and of the faith. The singing of the true preaching, of the true catechesis and of the true teaching of revelation. Raised toward the man this saint singing, these divine mysteries are celebrated through which the life of Christ the Lord becomes the life of every person that participates in the worship and lives the divine liturgy.
The Church lives by the Word. Only if she lives by the Word she might live of the Eucharist, of this divine power, which is the very God that comeswithin us, becomes our life so that we can accomplish His eternal will. If the Church does not live by the Word and for the Word, the Eucharist, that she distributes turns into a vain force. We are filled with grace, but to do what? The power of the Eucharist and of the grace consist in transformingthe Word heard and taught in fullness of truth in our daily lives.
Every cult which does not lead to the observance of the Word is in vain, it is also sinful. Often it also turns into a destroying scandal. Never might the Church tolerate this to happen. But do not all today, maybe seek a cult without Word? Do not all ask for the Eucharist with the sin in heart and mind?Do not those who have responsibility in the Church solicit so that we make reforms in this direction? The Church is the Church of the Word. If she separates the grace from the Word, she herself will be transformed into a den of thieves. A Church without Word is not needed by humanity.
Then Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.'” And every day he was teaching in the temple area. The chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people, meanwhile, were seeking to put him to death, but they could find no way to accomplish their purpose because all the people were hanging on his words.
It is the obligation of the Church to be vigilant about herself so that she does not become a den of thieves. It is her duty to distinguish betweenpastoral paths that lead people to a true conversion and various licenses to receive the sacraments without the heart being turned toward the Word of the Lord. She must always conduct herself avoiding the shoals of rigor and those of laxity. She is the teacher that must always know how to teachher children the true path of conversion. The Word is the primary commodity in which every other good is enclosed. Without the Word every other good is useless.
Virgin Mary, Mother of the Redemption, Angels and Saints make us listeners of the Word.