Hebrews 4:12-16 / Mark 2:13-17
We have a great high priest; He was tempted but did not sin.
In 1982 Archbishop Jozef Glemp of Warsaw wrote a letter urging Polish young people not to become discouraged or frustrated in their quest for change.
He told them he could sympathize with them because he himself was beaten by police when he was young and militant like them. The archbishop also said that his own father was punished severely for participating in a public protest against the Nazis. Just as Archbishop Glemp understood the pain and the frustration that Polish youth felt, so Jesus understands our pain and frustration. Jesus was someone who was like us in all things but sin.****
Do we ever speak to Jesus about how he handled pain and frustration? "Do not be conquered by evil but conquer evil with good." Romans 12:21
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The word of God is alive and active, says the first reading. It is so alive and active that this word of God, spoken by Jesus, changes sinners into saints. This word can judge, but it judges with mildness: by offering new chances. Do we offer these chances to others? Or does our attitude—if not words—of condemnation keep people confined within their mediocrity and failures?
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Matthew is a typical sinner, a tax collector, one who was not only exploiting his own people but a traitor to them as a collaborator with the Romans. But he responds to Jesus’ call and becomes an apostle and martyr, faithful to the end.
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It is understandable if non-Catholics have certain assumptions and expectations about Catholics. Because we are the largest as well as probably the most prominent Church and also the Church that the media will use for its interests. Hence Catholics are expected to be good people and living saintly lives and doing good deeds.
But when the opposite happens, then Catholics and the Catholic Church are in for bad publicity. That was what happened when Jesus called Levi the tax collector to be one of His disciples. The assumption was that if Jesus were a teacher and a holy man, then He should be choosing good and respectable people to be His disciples. Yet what Jesus said in the gospel reminds us of who He is and what the Church is all about.
He did not come to call the virtuous but sinners. Hence the Church is also for sinners just as the hospital is for the sick. Yet the Church is also a sign of salvation. The Church must always look to Jesus the high priest who has been tempted in every way that we are, though He is without sin (1st reading).
Let us be confident then that we shall have mercy from Him and find grace when we are in need of help. And let us be that sign of salvation that the world is looking for.
Let us pray: God of mercy and compassion, you call weak people, sinful as they are, to give shape to your dreams about people and their world and to be instruments of salvation. Give us trust, not in our own strength, but in the power of your love, which can do through us and with us what we ourselves are incapable of. We thank you for calling us out of our frailty and alienation through Jesus Christ, our Lord.
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Saint Margaret of Hungary
Margaret was born to Béla IV, king of Hungary, at a moment when the country was threatened by enemies. So the king promised God that if things reversed in his favor he would dedicate his little princess to the religious life. The prayer was answered, and Béla put Margaret in the care of the Dominican Sisters at Veszprém. When Margaret was 12, Béla built a convent for her on an island in the Danube near Buda. There the young teenager professed her vows.
A young woman of extraordinary beauty, St. Margaret attracted the attention of suitors even though she was a nun. Ottokar, the king of Bohemia, was determined to marry her. For political reasons, Béla liked the idea. He asked Margaret to get released from her commitments and marry Ottokar. Béla had not bargained for the steely resistance of his strong-willed daughter. She responded to his request with defiance:
When I was only 7-years-old, you tried to espouse me to the Polish Duke. You will remember my answer then. I said that I wished to serve him only to whom you had espoused me at my birth. As a child, I would not yield to your will in opposition to God’s claims on me. Do you think that I am likely to give in to you now that I am older and wiser? And am I more capable of grasping the greatness of the divine grace that has been given me? Then, my Father, stop trying to turn me from my determination to remain a religious. I prefer the heavenly kingdom to that which has been offered me by the King of Bohemia. I would rather die than obey these commands of yours that will bring death to my soul. Mark my words. If matters ever come to such a pass and I am driven to it, I will surely put an end to the whole affair by mutilating myself, so that I shall never again be desirable to any man.
So Béla backed down. Witnesses say that had he persisted, gritty Margaret would likely have fulfilled her threat. Margaret punished herself with extreme self-abnegation that some observers call “self-crucifixion.” She undertook the most menial and repugnant tasks. Butler’s Lives of the Saints says that she performed “marvelous” service to the sick, so nauseating that its “details cannot be set out before the fastidious modern reader.” Out of sympathy for the poor, Margaret also imitated their squalor. She so neglected all personal hygiene, for example, that she repulsed her sisters. And for long periods she denied herself food and sleep. Since she was a princess and the convent was built for her, no one seems to have been able to temper her excesses. Her utter disregard for her body certainly shortened her life. Margaret died on January 18, 1270 at the age of 28.
The church recognizes Margaret of Hungary as a saint in spite of the traces of willfulness and pride that seem to have marked her life. But she excelled in charity, and “love covers over many a sin” (1 Peter 4:8 NJB). Those of us who want to be holy, but have many “in-spite-ofs” to contend with, can be glad for that.
