How lovely is your dwelling Place, O God!

Listening to the Spirit

A Song of Ascents. Of David (Psalm 122)

I was glad when they said to me,
“Let us go to the house of the Lord!”
Our feet are standing
within your gates, O Jerusalem.

Jerusalem—built as a city
that is bound firmly together.
To it the tribes go up,
the tribes of the Lord,
as was decreed for Israel,
to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
For there the thrones for judgment were set up,
the thrones of the house of David.

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem:
“May they prosper who love you.
Peace be within your walls,
and security within your towers.”
For the sake of my relatives and friends
I will say, “Peace be within you.”
For the sake of the house of the Lord our God,
I will seek your good.

Listening to the Word

John 2:13-25

The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers seated at their tables. Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. He told those who were selling the doves, “Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!” His disciples remembered that it was written, “Zeal for your house will consume me.” The Jews then said to him, “What sign can you show us for doing this?” Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” The Jews then said, “This temple has been under construction for forty-six years, and will you raise it up in three days?” But he was speaking of the temple of his body. After he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this; and they believed the scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken.

When he was in Jerusalem during the Passover festival, many believed in his name because they saw the signs that he was doing. But Jesus on his part would not entrust himself to them, because he knew all people and needed no one to testify about anyone; for he himself knew what was in everyone.

Reflection

“A Church goer wrote a letter to the editor of a newspaper and complained that it made no sense to go to church every Sunday. “I’ve gone for 30 years now,” he wrote, “and in that time I have heard something like 3,000 sermons. But for the life of me, I can’t remember a single one of them. So, I think I’m wasting my time and the pastors are wasting theirs by giving sermons at all.” This started a real controversy in the “Letters to the Editor” column, much to the delight of the editor. It went on for weeks until someone wrote this clincher: “I’ve been married for 30 years now… In that time my wife has cooked some 32,000 meals. But, for the life of me, I cannot recall the entire menu for a single one of those meals. But I do know this… They all nourished me and gave me the strength I needed to do my work. If my wife had not given me these meals, I would be physically dead today. Likewise, if I had not gone to church for nourishment, I would be spiritually dead today!”

Jesus and his disciples went up to Jerusalem to attend the Passover. It must be a great joy for them to visit the Temple of God in Jerusalem. And like many other Jews, it must be a wonderful moment for them to do the pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The psalmist express it beautifully, “I rejoice when I heard them say, let us go up to the house of God. Our feet are standing within your gates O Jerusalem.” And for Jesus, the Temple of God in Jerusalem was a special place in his faith-journey. It was there that Jesus was presented by Mary and Joseph and blessed by Simeon (Lk 2:22-35). It was in that temple, Jesus, as a youth, spent time talking to the teachers of the Law (Lk 2:43-50). For Jesus the Temple of God is a place of nourishment.

And so we can understand the reaction of Jesus in today’s gospel when he saw the temple of God was surrounded not by people who searched for God but by those who were busy in business. The Temple of God is no longer the center of faith but become center-mall or market. The activities of buying and selling covered the glorious temple where God dwells. “Was Jesus, in cleansing the temple, attacking the temple itself? No. And did Jesus, in making his remark, say he would destroy the temple? No. He cleansed the temple out of love for his Father and his Father’s house. He was disappointed because the temple is no longer a place of spiritual nourishment but merely physical-nourishment.

The business around the Temple of God also prevents people to meet and welcome the New Temple of God, Jesus, in their midst. The new Temple of God did, in fact, come down from heaven. It dwelt among man (Jn. 1:14). “It” is a man: “Christ is the true temple of God, ‘the place where his glory dwells’; by the grace of God, Christians also become temples of the Holy Spirit, living stones out of which the Church is built” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1197). Through baptism we become joined to the one Body of Christ, and that Body, the Church, is the “one temple of the Holy Spirit” (CCC, 776).

What are you looking for in the Church? What are you searching for when you attend the Mass? A beautiful homily of the Priest? Or are you looking for a wonderful choir or service? All these things are your emotional needs and you need all of this. But do not forget an essential thing that your heart is searching for: Jesus, the New Temple of God who came down and dwelt among us. So, perhaps it would be good if we spend time with God in prayer than waste it with cellphone when you are in the Church or the Temple of God. Instead of texting let us talking with Jesus who dwells in our hearts. Don’t you know that your body is the Temple of the Holy Spirit? By doing so we honor the Temple of God where He dwells. Let us make our Church, Sunday worship as a place and a moment of nourishment.