YEAR B: HOMILY FOR SATURDAY OF THE TENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME (1)

YEAR B: HOMILY FOR SATURDAY OF THE TENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME

HOMILY THEME: LET YOUR YES MEAN YES

BY: Fr. Benny Tuazon

HOMILY:

(Mt. 5:33-37) Saturday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary Time

In the day’s Gospel Jesus continued His sermon on the mount. This time He dealt with false oaths. Jesus warned His listeners from religious leaders and members who made use of Scriptures, religious principles, laws, and other elements of the faith to take advantage of fellow members. With vested interests and skewed attitude, deception using faith may be successful. Gullible listeners possess that weakness of being easily swayed by charismatic preachers. Listeners should be more discerning and extra careful from there cunning liars.

The Disciple should never commit executing false oaths. The words maybe excellent and sincere. The act of making the oath maybe honorable and respectful. But the intentions may be impure and diabolical. How many times have we heard of members being duped by their leaders to sell their properties and donate the proceeds to the “faith”? How many times have we heard of preachers quoting Scriptures out of context and using them to support their evil agenda? I am sure you have heard some politicians and supporters use “Give to Caesar what is to Caesar and to God what is to God” to remind the Church of the separation of Church and State?

A friend once intimated to me about an elected official who would always begin any meeting with a prayer and would quote a lot from Scriptures when some things are explained. Then, sometime in the meeting, that official, without an iota of embarrassment, arrogantly would state how much grease money is needed to seal a deal! “Ang kapal ng mukha! Nagdasal pa at sumitas sa Banal na Kasulatan.” As much as possible, my friend would evade meeting with that official. It just stinks!

Maybe some priests, lay leaders, and members had been guilty of this false oath too. The line between a false oath and a sincere one is very thin. The internal attitude of the person is hard to see. But we can begin with assessing the fruits of his actions. When they benefit others and not Himself, most probably he did a sincere oath. When he shows humility, maybe it was a sincere oath. When he becomes closer to God, he must have been sincere. Jesus was on target about His warning. Let us take care to heed His warning.