A Gentile In The Temple Precincts? Horrors!

Thursday of 7th Week in Easter

It would be great if all of us were following St. Paul’s trials and troubles chapter by chapter along with hearing them proclaimed at Mass. The scene is this: Paul has journeyed with his disciples to Jerusalem. Some of them were Gentiles and most were probably Jewish Christians. But the Jewish community of Jerusalem, traditionally hostile to anything or anyone non-Jewish, seems to have hardened even more since the first Pentecost. So when they heard a rumor that Paul had brought an uncircumcised foreigner into the Temple, they rioted. The Romans arrested Paul and were going to scourge him when they learned he was a Roman citizen by birth. So they allowed the chief priests and Sanhedrin to hear him.

Now we need to remember that the whole ministry of the Israelites was supposed to be to offer right worship and right living to God, and be so attractive to the pagans that they drew them into right worship and right living. There was even the outer area of the Temple called the Court of the Gentiles. Jesus came to bring all humanity together into intimate relationship with the Trinity, but the Church of the first century was clearly having trouble, just as we do today. Even Paul testifying to His encounter with Jesus risen from the dead caused dissension between Sadducee and Pharisee, because the priestly class didn’t believe in the bodily resurrection of the just.

Our Gospel, then, is exactly right. We need to be one, just as the Trinity is One God. It is particularly concerning that our nation is so very divided in this century, and that we even have Catholic political leaders who are playing faux-theologian with the human right to life. Confusion reigns, and that’s mostly the fault of the secular media, and our own faulted human nature that fights the Holy Spirit. What should be our united response? We must double down our prayers, especially for those who are trying, like the Jerusalem crowd, to tear us even further apart.