Homily based on the Gospel of Mark 10: 2-12.
Today in our Gospel we hear what we hear quite often, we get some Pharisees trying to trip Jesus up and they ask him, what does the Law say about Divorce.
Knowing Jesus would be caught between the Law, which he couldn’t speak out against and his teaching of Love and God’s plan, he’d be caught between the two, Jesus turns the question back on the Pharisees by asking them, “what did Moses say?”
They proceed to tell Jesus that Moses allowed it, they were to draw up a writ of dismissal and so, divorce would happen. What Moses actually said was done so to prevent frivolous divorces and protect the rights of the innocent party, which in those days would have been the woman.
In those days the husband sent his wife away, people would automatically assume that she had committed adultery. So to provide her protection from being stigmatised and allowing her to freely remarry, Moses demanded that a certificate stating the real reason should be issued; a writ. That’s a very long way from saying, Moses said that divorce is okay.
Jesus then turned it on them again and told them that Moses wrote this command for you because of your hard hearts. Then he goes on to quote Genesis and the Garden of Eden, our first reading.
Jesus trumps Moses…with Moses. He doesn’t go back to Sinai – he goes back to Creation. There’s no question that God’s original design for marriage was one man and one woman for life. But here’s the thing: Jesus didn’t come to this earth to save marriages; he didn’t come to stop the legalising same-sex marriage. He certainly didn’t come to condone divorce or adultery. He came to seek and to save the lost; Jesus came to save sinners, all of us, the conservatives, those who think that there is no other option but to abide by their vows, until death and the more liberal, those who throw it away at the first sign of trouble, and those (probably the majority) who struggle to find a “suitable” way to make it through a failing marriage, a painful marriage, an abusive marriage or see no other way but to separate and go against genuinely taken vows.
The Samaritan woman at the well who had had five husbands and was living with a sixth (John 4). The woman caught in adultery the Pharisees wanted to stone to death (Luke 8:1-11). Neither of them condemned by Jesus.
Jesus didn’t come to justify our sin but to justify us by becoming sin for us – to become the things that we all are in the messiness of life – so that by being baptised into him and believing in him we might become the possession of God. He came to obey the Law in order to free us from the Law so that we can be free to be who God has made us – single, married, divorced or widowed – without fear, without dread of judgment, without the shame that causes us to hide from God and perhaps point blame at others.
If we come to Jesus to help us justify our lives in God’s eyes – we’re barking up the wrong tree.
On the other hand, if you know you have nothing – no excuse, no justification, no loophole – nothing but our mixed up and messy lives, our sins, to offer to Jesus, then we’re absolutely in the right place.
To the Samaritan Woman at the well, he tells her, “a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks”, pointing out more of what we hear today that it is the Spirit and following God is way more than what the law has to say.
I’m painfully aware that today’s readings may be difficult for some to hear, my words may have opened a doorway that you may not have wanted to look in.
I looked to Pope Francis himself and what he says about Marriage and came across a piece about same sex marriage, and you know what, this to me cuts to the chase on Marriage as a whole, and Divorce for that matter:
He writes in October 2023 referring to the allowing of a Priest to give a blessing to same sex couples; he said that “people seeking a transcendent relationship with God and looking for his love and mercy should not be subject to “an exhaustive moral analysis” as a pre-condition for receiving it. He went on, “Ultimately, a blessing offers people a means to increase their trust in God,” the document said. “The request for a blessing, thus, expresses and nurtures openness to the transcendence, mercy, and closeness to God in a thousand concrete circumstances of life” He added: “It is a seed of the Holy Spirit that must be nurtured, not hindered.”
But think of that last bit, and thinking back to Jesus’ confrontation with the Pharisees; we must nurture the seed of the Holy Spirit, and we must do this in all aspects of life, in newness of faith, in newness of relationships, in the breaking up of relationships and marriages. We should do our best to follow the rules but not feel helpless and hopeless in front of God if we fail.
I am incredibly fortunate to have met and married my wife and after 33 years together, having just celebrated 25 years of marriage, it’s easy for me to stand here and talk about the eternal joining together. We’re not unique in that, but neither are those couples who don’t end up this way.
I’m not a counsellor, and certainly not a judge on this matter, so I wanted to end with a bit of a reiteration of the actual words of Pope Francis, and the fundamental teaching of Christ.
Remember, to quote Pope Francis: “people seeking a relationship with God and looking for his love and mercy should not be subject to “an exhaustive moral analysis” in order to receive it. The seed of the Holy Spirit should be nurtured not hindered.
Christ teaches us to love and more, so to accept God’s forgiveness by focussing on God and of the Spirit.
Life gets messy; life can be glorious, it can hurt, and it can be difficult, it can be joyous, all of these things. If we focus on things of Christ, emptying ourselves before Christ, placing ourselves and all the messiness of our life in front of God, we’re in the right place.
Deacon Tony.