Scripture of the Week
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Gospel And Reflection
The Dedication of the Lateran Basilica Year C
First Reading – Ezekiel 47:1-2. 8-9. 12
A reading from the prophet Ezekiel
I see water flowing from the temple and all who were touched by it were saved.
The angel brought me to the entrance of the Temple, where a stream came out from under the Temple threshold and flowed eastwards, since the Temple faced east. The water flowed from under the right side of the Temple, south of the altar. He took me out by the north gate and led me right round outside as far as the outer east gate where the water flowed out on the right-hand side. The man went to the east holding his measuring line and measured off a thousand cubits; he then made me wade across the stream; the water reached my ankles. He measured off another thousand and made me wade across the stream again; the water reached my knees. He measured off another thousand and made me wade across again; the water reached my waist. He measured off another thousand; it was now a river which I could not cross; the stream had swollen and was now deep water, a river impossible to cross. He then said, ‘Do you see, son of man?’ He took me further, then brought me back to the bank of the river. When I got back, there were many trees on each bank of the river. He said, ‘This water flows east down to the Arabah and to the sea; and flowing into the sea it makes its waters wholesome. Wherever the river flows, all living creatures teeming in it will live. Fish will be very plentiful, for wherever the water goes it brings health, and life teems wherever the river flows. Along the river, on either bank, will grow every kind of fruit tree with leaves that never wither and fruit that never fails; they will bear new fruit every month, because this water comes from the sanctuary. And their fruit will be good to eat and the leaves medicinal.’
Responsorial Psalm
Ps 45:2-3. 5-6. 8-9. R. v.5
(R.) The waters of the river gladden the city of God.
Second Reading – 1 Corinthians 3:9-11. 16-17
A reading from the first letter of St Paul to the Corinthians
You are the temple of God.
You are God’s building. By the grace God gave me, I succeeded as an architect and laid the foundations, on which someone else is doing the building. Everyone doing the building must work carefully. For the foundation, nobody can lay any other than the one which has already been laid, that is Jesus Christ.
Didn’t you realise that you were God’s temple and that the Spirit of God was living among you? If anybody should destroy the temple of God, God will destroy him, because the temple of God is sacred; and you are that temple.
Gospel Acclamation – 2 Chronicles 7:16
Alleluia, alleluia!
I have chosen and sanctified this house, says the Lord,
that my name may remain in it for all time.
Alleluia!
Gospel – John 2:13-22
A reading from the holy Gospel according to John
He spoke about the temple of his own body.
Just before the Jewish Passover Jesus went up to Jerusalem, and in the Temple he found people selling cattle and sheep and pigeons, and the money changers sitting at their counters there. Making a whip out of some cord, he drove them all out of the Temple, cattle and sheep as well, scattered the money changers’ coins, knocked their tables over and said to the pigeon-sellers, ‘Take all this out of here and stop turning my Father’s house into a market’. Then his disciples remembered the words of scripture: Zeal for your house will devour me. The Jews intervened and said, ‘What sign can you show us to justify what you have done?’ Jesus answered, ‘Destroy this sanctuary, and in three days I will raise it up’. The Jews replied, ‘It has taken forty-six years to build this sanctuary: are you going to raise it up in three days?’ But he was speaking of the sanctuary that was his body, and when Jesus rose from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and they believed the scripture and the words he had said.
Gospel Reflection
We Cannot Live without Beauty or the Symbolic in our Lives
Reflection on the Gospel-Dedication of the Lateran Basilica
(John 2:13-22)
My mother once told us (her children) never to replicate a mistake that she had made when she was first married. She received an unexpected £2000 bequest from a relative and found herself confronted with a choice between purchasing furniture for the house my dad had just built and investing in a Dobell painting that had come on the market. After a good deal of soul-searching, she opted for the furniture. Reflecting on this decision many years later, she told us: “You can sit on kerosene tins or wooden cartons, but you cannot live without beauty or the symbolic in your life. Never make the mistake that I made.” That advice comes to mind again as I consider today’s feast and as I reflect on those who, over the ages, have taken to heart the message of the prophet Haggai and have attended to the building of God’s house of worship.
Why celebrate the dedication of a church? Why does this feast override the sequence of Sundays in Ordinary Time? Why is it so important? It is not so much a question of the beauty of the Church of St John Lateran in Rome that makes it so important. It rather has to do with what this particular church signifies for Christians. The first Lateran Basilica was built in the time of the Emperor Constantine. Many of the Church Councils from the seventh century to the sixteenth century were held there. It was known as the “mother and head of all the churches of the city (Rome) and of the world.” It is the Pope’s church and the basilica of Rome. As such, it has functioned as a sign of unity for all Christians from the fourth century of the common era and has the potential to function in this way for all Catholic Christians in our times.
The selection from John’s gospel presents Jesus driving the money-changers and the merchants from the Temple precinct in Jerusalem. These people had a legitimate function there, but some were more interested in financial gain than in respect for the Temple as God’s dwelling place and as a locus of worship. Jesus affirms the Temple as God’s ‘house’. He goes on to speak of the temple of his body that God will “raise up” after three days. The gospel is thus a subtle reminder that the building is God’s house only if our lives are congruent with what the building signifies. In Paul’s theology, the church and its members are “God’s building”. The term “church” has come to designate both the architectural edifice and the believers who assemble for worship. Beautiful church buildings play a crucial role in raising our hearts and minds to God and in leading us to deep respect for all of God’s creation. That is most certainly true of my regular place of worship, the Church of Saints Peter and Paul in Buninyong, Victoria. My mother was right about the power of the symbolic.
Sr Veronica Lawson rsm
© The scriptural quotations are taken from the Jerusalem Bible, published and copyright 1966, 1967 and 1968 by Darton Longman and Todd Ltd and Doubleday & Co Inc, and used by permission of the publishers. The English translation of the Psalm Responses, the Alleluia and Gospel Verses, and the Lenten Gospel Acclamations, and the Titles, Summaries, and Conclusion of the Readings, from the Lectionary for Mass © 1997, 1981, 1968, International Committee on English in the Liturgy, Inc. All rights reserved.