18/11/2022

Jesus' drives the merchants out of the Temple. It is not a task that could be completed easily by one man. The Temple was, as were all temples, not only the place to worship but also the place to keep your wealth safe from thieves. Business transactions between Rome and Yemen could be financed with reference to treasure in the Temple. In this respect it was more like the Bank of England than St Paul's Cathedral.

Jesus is with us to show us the way his Father and ours wants us to live in Love. In the incarnation the Father, creator of the whole Cosmos, has reduced himself to experience life in the body exactly as we do, except for personal sin. The Son is one with the Father so there is only Good in him, but he is also one with us and experiences the same emotions as do we all. He is angry in the Temple not because this buying and selling is something new to him or to the Temple, but because the worldly Mamon has overtaken the awareness of God in his covenant with his people Israel, that this place should be.

Many are the incidents recorded in the Gospels that open our eyes to our own selves and to the Institution that is Jesus, Father Son and Holy Spirit still with us. It is so easy to see the analogy between Temple Wealth and Vatican Portfolio. Bishops who have been called by God to lead his people along the right path to do his will today are more concerned with protecting their own career paths than speaking the Truth that comes from Heaven.

The wealth of the Roman Catholic Church is not the Patrimony of Peter but the gladness that comes from doing the will of God by helping us to shout "Amen" to the grace that flows over the whole world. The sins of our pastors have to be acknowledged and revealed by the Church before they are ferreted out by those who revel in our sinfulness. Pope, bishops, priests have to show to the whole world that God emptied himself to experience in our flesh the horror that we choose to create by saying "no" to his will for us. God does not fudge, with him "Yes" is "Yes" and "No" is "No".

Dear Lord you know my sinfulness and my efforts at repentance. Grant that I do not add to the rejection of your Love that is the evil of sin. Open my being that I may accept the Love that is the only reason for me being here and hear the prayers of the Saints and your Mother, who never knew sin, that I live this day sinlessly in Love. May the Holy Souls who are repenting totally for the sins of their worldly egos come to share in the Mercy of your Cross and may there be some comfort for those still suffering in this World especially those innocent little ones who are all known to you.