Reflection
In today’s gospel, we see Jesus and his disciples walking through a field of grain. The disciples experienced a very human condition: they were hungry. Naturally, as the grain was right there at hand, they began to pick and eat it. The Pharisees, ever vigilant, call out this behavior because it breaks the Sabbath rules. Jesus counters with reminding them where King David did something similar and then concludes with,
“The Son of Man is lord of the sabbath.”
It’s almost as if Jesus is quoting that old adage, “some rules are meant to be broken.“ This is a recurring scene in the gospels, with many passages showing Jesus doing good on the Sabbath and then being reprimanded by the religious authorities. Is Jesus teaching us that the rules don’t matter?
When I was a young man, and I first encountered this gospel passage, I thought to myself, “Aha! I don’t have to follow all these rules!” But what I lacked at that tender age was the ability to discern.
I believe what Jesus is teaching here is that we need to look at the whole picture when deciding what course of action is correct.
The catechism of the Catholic Church says, in part: “The circumstances, including the consequences, are secondary elements of a moral act. They contribute to increasing or diminishing the moral goodness or evil of human acts.” Just as Jesus took into account a wider view then simply, “what do the rules say?“ we are called to use the spirit-given gift of discernment as we go through our lives. Yes, it’s much simpler to have an ironbound set of rules that are applied without thought in every situation, without regard to the greater circumstances that we find ourselves in. But then we face the true danger of falling into the same behavior that Jesus was naming in the Pharisees. We, as Christians, are called to be Christ’s hands at work in the world, taking the time to discern the Father’s will when confronted with challenging decision decisions and allowing His Spirit to work through us.
