In our
Gospel passage, the Lord is in Jerusalem to undergo His cross and
resurrection. From the Mount of Olives,
He views the Holy City, the city which will reject and crucify Him. The Jerusalem of our Lord’s time had lost its
way. It would find peace, but the awful
peace which follows war and destruction with its fall in 70 AD. To the Pharisaism of the day which dominated
the religion of Israel, the Lord would cleanse the temple, for His teaching and
sacrifice. In this moment of tears, the
Lord takes possession of Jerusalem for His salvific work. It is there that He will be crucified and
rise; it is there that the Holy Ghost will descend on the Apostles and the
Blessed Mother; it is from there that the mission goes out to all the world.
St. Paul
tells us in the Epistle that the calamities of old were given to us in figure,
that is, as an example, as a warning. God
has endowed us with a supernatural soul, an intellect and will to know and to
love Him, a conscience to guide us to all truth. We may have the peace and consolation of the
Holy Ghost by welcoming the Savior and His teaching. On the other hand, we have seen in the not
too distant history of the world that awful peace, which is not peace at all
but complacency, which comes from having no conscience at all.
In his last
epistle, Second Timothy, St. Paul, in prison, is handing over his work to his
young assistant. He says to him, “Keep
watch over yourself, and over your teaching.”
In a similar episode in the Acts of the Apostles, he says, “Be careful
of yourself.” We have a healthy sense of
our frailty to know the truth and do the good.
We do not always know how to love as we should. And, yet, at the same time, we have an
immovable trust in God and in the sufficiency of His grace. As the Epistle says, God is faithful, He will
not allow us to be tempted beyond that which we are able.
What assurance
the Lord gives us, that, with docile hearts, we can know the truth and do the
good. And not only assurance, but dignity,
the dignity of our faculties enlightened by faith and strengthened by
grace. And not only dignity, but peace,
the peace that we have welcomed the Messiah, and all that He has revealed to us
about God, and the plan, in His sacrifice and teaching, for our salvation.
