Criticism – an expression of love. We all dislike criticism, as it often targets areas we think we’re handling well or consider off-limits to others.. After all, who is comfortable when someone tells them: you are a bad husband, you are a bad mother, you raise your children badly, you are lazy, you are dishonest and various other criticisms. Criticism of religious life is also a sensitive area. Even then, we usually get upset when someone has reservations about the style of our religious life. Jesus Christ shows us that criticism is sometimes necessary. In the Gospels, he is typically presented to us as a critic of the religious life of some Jewish elite groups, especially the Pharisees and scribes.
A central point of tension between Jesus and his opponents was the fundamental nature of religion. The Pharisees and scribes saw the essence in the observance of external religious regulations. Evangelist Mark reminds us of some of them today. They are regulations regarding ritual purity. Washing hands up to the wrist. Swimming. Washing cups, jugs, basins, and beds. They saw in this a connection with the tradition of their ancestors and the most appropriate expression of their relationship with God. That is why they boast to Jesus about the apostles that they do not do the same and despise the old traditions, ceremonies, regulations, and customs. Jesus’ idea of what is important in religion is different. He does not consider the preservation of the tradition of the fathers to be the main thing, but the preservation of God’s commands. And it especially emphasizes the quality of the human heart. All things are good. Only man can be evil and impure. The heart decides what is pure and what is impure. As the heart is, so is the whole person, his life and the whole world. Everything around us is colored by the color of our heart. Everything that happens in the world was born in the heart of man. Man and the world are the image of the human heart.
Jesus doesn’t reject Jewish regulations and traditions, but rather subordinates them to a greater priority: a transformed heart.. What does Jesus’ criticism of the Pharisees and scribes tell us at this moment? Does it concern us too, or is it just an old problem of Jesus and the Jews? Is our religion a religion of the heart, or just the outward manifestations that we too have inherited? In the history of the Church, we see the human effort to enrich individual religious acts. What Jesus gave in a simple way and expression, man tried to enrich with his abilities. Jesus laid the foundation and man strives to build on it. We know, for example, that the essence of the Last Supper and today’s Holy Mass is the same. But if the ceremony of the Last Supper was very simple, the Church has enriched this ceremony in the course of history. Churches began to be built, mass prayers and songs were created. Each era has created such a liturgy to suit the conditions of the environment and time. And that concerns the administration of all the sacraments.
Or Jesus didn’t tell us what body position we should have when praying. People figured out that it’s good for a person to kneel, or stand, or sit on their heels, or have their arms folded or crossed. Jesus did not tell us how, for example, he imagines Marian devotion. Church, people, saints, created Marian prayers, litanies, rosary, statues, chapels and pilgrimages. We have inherited all this and many other things, and we are also enriching them. But we certainly have to ask: what is the relationship of Jesus to this magnificent work that man and the Church have created throughout history and will continue to create in order to enrich their religious life? It is certainly sympathetic to Jesus. After all, everything that helps a better religion, Jesus also blesses. However, even at this moment he is saying to us: It is nice what you have done, but show me your heart.
Jesus is interested in how the sacraments, prayers, pilgrimages and other religious manifestations helped us to improve our heart. If he sees in our heart evil thoughts, fornication, theft, adultery, greed, sensuality, unchastity, envy, slander, pride and stupidity, so do we. he must say: “This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me. You forsake the commandments of God and hold to the traditions of men.” Although we do not like criticism, yet in one case we accept it more easily. It is when we feel that he who criticizes us also likes us. Jesus likes us and he cares about the quality of our religious life. If we are touched by his criticism, let us humbly accept it and obey his advice.
