Daily Gospel Reflection
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September 6, 2024
The scribes and Pharisees said to Jesus,
“The disciples of John the Baptist fast often and offer prayers,
and the disciples of the Pharisees do the same;
but yours eat and drink.”
Jesus answered them, “Can you make the wedding guests fast
while the bridegroom is with them?
But the days will come, and when the bridegroom is taken away from them,
then they will fast in those days.”
And he also told them a parable.
“No one tears a piece from a new cloak to patch an old one.
Otherwise, he will tear the new
and the piece from it will not match the old cloak.
Likewise, no one pours new wine into old wineskins.
Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins,
and it will be spilled, and the skins will be ruined.
Rather, new wine must be poured into fresh wineskins.
And no one who has been drinking old wine desires new,
for he says, ‘The old is good.’”
This gospel passage first struck me as disjointed. Why would Jesus jump from a discussion about fasting to offering advice on how to mend clothes and ferment wine?
The connection between the garments and the wine seems to lie in the idea of tearing. A patch made from a new garment will shrink after washing, which would cause the edges of the patch to tear away from the rest of the garment, thus leaving a larger hole than before.
Similarly, new wine continues to ferment over time. If placed in a stretched out old wine skin, the gas produced by the fermentation of new wine would cause the wine skin to rupture and spill the wine.
But, what does that have to do with the Pharisees’ concerns about fasting? I think Jesus was warning us against a social kind of tearing. We hear the scribes and the Pharisees reference “the disciples of John” and “the disciples of the Pharisees” then juxtapose these groups with Jesus’ own disciples. They take a community of people, tear them into factions, then place them against one another.
The last 2000 years have not freed us from this sinful tendency towards division. How quickly we divide ourselves based on political opinions, social status, and even liturgical preference!
My heart hurts at the thought of remaining so focused on tearing people into groups that I can miss Jesus standing in front of me.
Jesus came to bring us to God. To gather us together so that we might know Christ both personally and communally. Let’s ask God to prepare our hearts as new wineskins ready to stretch and receive “the other” as Christ.
Prayer
Jesus, we know that you are always with us, leading and guiding us through your Spirit. At the same time, we long for that time when we will experience the fullness of your presence in the wedding feast of heaven. We ask that you send your Spirit to strengthen us through the difficulties of this life so that we may be prepared even now for life eternal. We ask this in your most holy name. Amen.
Saint of the Day
St. Eleutherius was an abbot who led a monastery in sixth-century Italy, and was known for working miracles.
One story tells of him healing a boy of demonic possession. The boy was brought to his monastery for care and education, and for a long time exhibited no signs of his possession.
Eleutherius said, “Now that the devil has to deal with the servants of God he does not dare come near the child.” As soon as he had said this, the boy was convulsed by the demon. Eleutherius was ashamed for having boasted and commanded the whole community to fast and pray until the boy was healed.
At another time, Eleutherius is said to have raised a dead man back to life.
St. Eleutherius died in 585 in the monastery he led, and his relics rest in the reliquary chapel in the Basilica. His image is used here with permission from Catholic.org.
St. Eleutherius, you battled the devil and worked miracles--pray for us!