Tuesday of the Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Year A

Memorial of John Mary Vianney

Jeremiah 30:1-2. 12-15. 18-22

Psalm 102:16-18. 19-21. 29 and 22-23

Matthew 15:1-2. 10-14

Hypocrisy, a heart far from God

Love must act, it always does. Without action Love is nothing. You cannot say you Love someone and do nothing to prove it. Love goes with action. Good actions are appreciated.

Genesis 6:5 

"Yahweh saw that human wickedness was great on earth and that human hearts contrived nothing but wicked schemes all day long."

That which led to the Flood and consequently recreation was wickedness that came  from human heart. So the problem was about what humans love. Choosing to love wickedness, wickedness was seen in their actions. 

Since what we love determines what we do, we must be careful about what we choose to love. Our hearts turn towards both the Creator and creature, hence we can love all things including the Creator who made them. However, the greatest problem is that, what we will use to choose is corrupted, and decisions that proceed from the hearts are mostly corrupted.  

The dangerous action that flows from our corrupted hearts which still can turn towards the Creator and  creatures is deception. Good actions are appreciated and performing actions that show a heart turned towards God, who alone is good, is highly appreciated by society. 

However, since the underlying reason is to please humans, it rather shows how far our hearts are from God.  Traditions of humans are to please humans and these make us mostly saints in the streets, devils under our roofing sheets. We conform to the traditions that will please man and our actions blind us so that we see no fault in them.

This is actually what seeking to please humans rather than God means, you limit Love which is the essence of the Law of God, because love is eternal and is from God. Today, Jesus Christ scandalized the Pharisees with the statement that, "what enters the mouth does not make one unclean but what come out from one's heart."  

How can the truth scandalize people? We mostly think outward appearances are signs of holiness and also what we get from outside pollute us. But that which we lose sight of is ourselves. Since the more natural a thing is the more difficult it is to be discovered, we fail to realize  our corrupted nature and weaknesses, and we end up in great sins and dangers because we trust our strength and way of life rather than God.

Since the only good one who can make us saints is God, it is only to him that we must entrust all our decisions so that we don't damn our souls. 

Luke 6:45

"Good people draw what is good from the store of goodness in their hearts; bad people draw what is bad from the store of badness. For the words of the mouth flow out of what fills the heart."

Let's allow God to fill us with his goodness as he did St. John Vianney whom we celebrate today, so that actions flowing from our hearts may lead others to know themselves, and love God above all things.

By Sylvester Amakye-Quayson 

Edited by 

Michael Owusu Amponsah