Ez.16,1-15 Is.12 Mt.19,3-12
"Some Pharisees approached Jesus and to put him to the test.They said to him ’Is it against the Law for a man to divorce his wife on any pretext whatever?’
He answered ’Have you not read that the Creator from the beginning made them male and female and that He said : This is why a man leaves his father and mother and becomes attached to his wife ,and the two become one flesh?’
They are no longer two therefore, but one flesh. So then what God has united, human beings must not divide!".
At the time of Jesus, there were several interpretations about the reasons allowing divorce. Jesus invites those listening to him to come back to God’s original plan of Love.
If it is hard to love, we draw close to the source of Love so as to draw from it strength in God’s grace.
Jesus gives an answer about the future of man and woman, by giving back the meaning given at the beginning of Creation. So as to put them into security, he places his adversaries on the ground of their knowledge, but he says’ It is because of your stubbornness that Moses permitted you to send away wives."
So Jesus brings to light a real difficulty they have and which imprisons them : their ’hardness of heart. ’In the beginning, it wasn’t like that.’
It is in union between us that it is given for us to form our existence as a sign of God’s Life. Jesus, put to test, is a model of humility! He knows what is in mankind, he can see what sickness is in his heart, He has come to heal it. For us his pedagogy is quite enlightening.
"The Pharisees said to Jesus; ’Then why did Moses command that a writ of dismissal should be given in case of divorce?’ He said to them, ’It was because you were so hard-hearted, that Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but it was not like this from the beginning. Now I say this to you : anyone who
divorces his wife- I am not speaking of an illicit marriage- and marries another, is guilty of adultery."
Jesus’ perspective takes into account life’s hazards and situations in life which are the consequence of the hardening of hearts, the violence of men amongst themselves, wounds received.
It is not easy to love. It is demanding to be charitable because charity doesn’t seek its own satisfaction but first and foremost the good of another. Each life, in being associated to others in various ways, manifests in its own way our common filiation. It welcomes in the hollow of our lives all its hardships of our lives, all our chaotic situations.
Our life is called to signify the secret it bears, that we are all children of God. Our way of being attests who we are, it bears witness to this, and so makes up the human community altogether as an expression of its mystery. The human community is made to share its perfect unity in the Blessed Trinity in which we shall have a share in Heaven.
Our vocation as a Christian is to allow the Word and grace of Christ to penetrate into our hearts and minds so as not to let this atmosphere of disorder affect our lives.
“His disciples said to him, ’If that is how things are between husband and wife, it is advisable not to marry.’”But he replied ’It is not everyone who can accept what I have said, but only those to whom it is granted. There are eunuchs born so from their mother’s womb, then there are eunuchs made so by human agency and there are eunuchs who have made themselves so for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven. Let anyone accept who can."
Jesus’ openness is surprising! When Jesus is asked about the question of marriage, he takes up the question of the meaning of life and of its final fecundity. If the reality about marriage is a covenant wanted by the Creator, another reality also announces God’s infinite Love.
’For there are eunuchs who have been so since their mother’s womb, there are some who have become so because of what men have done to them, and there are those who have made themselves so because of the Kingdom of Heaven. ’
Whatever our situation might be, what is asked of us is to love. We are asked to be open to our sisters and brothers and to walk humbly with them, following Jesus Christ, towards life. We are asked to express in our daily life the mystery we live from, express and invent this life that we receive from God our Father.
In the evening of our life, we shall be judged on Love.
Christ suffered and died so that we can have right from this very moment what we shall have in heaven : unity.