Daily Gospel Reflection
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August 26, 2020
Jesus said, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which on the outside look beautiful, but inside they are full of the bones of the dead and of all kinds of filth. So you also on the outside look righteous to others, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous, and you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ Thus you testify against yourselves that you are descendants of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your ancestors.”
Jesus cries out against the hypocrisy of the Pharisees in today’s gospel. Their carefully crafted outward appearances are a thin veneer over their self interest and spiritual corruption.
The image of a decorated tomb in this passage functions on two levels. On the first level, it is a metaphor for the Pharisees themselves. The outside is presentable, well decorated, and meant to attract praise while the inside is filled with decay (moral, social, and spiritual). On the second level of meaning, the tombs represent the tombs of the prophets of ancient Israel. The Pharisees decorate these tombs to honor the prophets yet, as Jesus points out, their lives do not embody the messages of the prophets they seek to honor. On this second level of meaning, that which is inside the tombs–the prophet of old– is honorable and the decoration on the outside of the tomb is dishonorable because it represents the Pharisees’ hypocrisy.
Have I, too, “decorated the graves of the righteous?” Have I been more concerned with my own image as I post on social media about the crises of racial injustice, the global pandemic, and economic instability? Am I thinking more about how people will perceive me than about the actual issues facing us? Am I more concerned about myself than those who have actually suffered and died?
The Pharisees claim that if they had lived in the days of their ancestors, they would not have taken part in “shedding the blood of the prophets.” It is easy for us to look back at injustices and see that they are wrong. It is much harder to see injustice in our own day and stand against it. That takes a prophet. That’s what Jesus was; that’s what Jesus calls us to be.
Prayer
Lord God, your Son walked among us flawed human beings. He loved the poor, the sick, and the widowed. He delighted in little children. He sat at table with men and women who were sinners and called them to new life. Only hypocrisy raised anger in Jesus. Open our eyes and hearts to see ourselves as we are and to cast ourselves upon your mercy rather than to cover our shame with lying to ourselves and to those around us. Amen.
Saint of the Day
Our Lady of Czestochowa is an image of Mary located in Poland. The icon is also known as the Black Madonna because the image has darkened from the soot of so many votive candles burning near it. Czestochowa is one of the most popular pilgrimage sites in Poland—many people visit the shrine to venerate Mary in this icon.
Tradition holds that the icon was painted by St. Luke upon wood that had been part of the table in the home of the Holy Family. It is said that the image was kept in royal palaces in Constantinople and Ukraine after St. Helen found it in Jerusalem. It came to Czestochowa in 1382 by way of a nobleman who was escaping an attack in Ukraine—he stopped to rest in the town and entrusted it to a monastery there.
In 1430, robbers looted the monastery and stole the image. In trying to remove precious stones from the icon, they smashed the wood and made slashes in the paint. When the icon was restored, the artists retained the slashes that were made on Mary’s face.
In the image, Mary’s hand points to Jesus, as she did with her whole life. Jesus holds a book of the Gospels in one hand and extends the other to the viewer in a blessing.
The image is associated with a miracle that marked a turning point in a war between Poland and Sweden in 1655. Monks and other people in the monastery were severely outnumbered by the invading Swedish forces but managed to repel the attackers with the miraculous intervention of Mary.
The image also played a large role in the devotional life of the young St. Maximilian Kolbe; he experienced a moment of conversion as a boy when he was praying in front of this image, and the experience shaped the rest of his life.
A replica of the Our Lady of Czestochowa image stands in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, and it faithfully reproduces even the slash marks on Mary’s face. The image was a gift to Father Edward Sorin, C.S.C., founder of Notre Dame, from the Polish Carmelite Sisters in the Shrine of St. Bridget in Rome. The sisters gave it to Father Sorin, who was superior general of the Congregation of Holy Cross at the time, “as a sign of perpetual friendship.”
Our Lady of Czestochowa, you are captured in the miraculous image of Mary venerated by Polish people—pray for us!
Personalize and share a prayer card with this image of Our Lady of Czestochowa at our prayer card page.