They Become One

October 3, Sunday

Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

The first pages of the Bible tell us that God created man and woman in his own image. That means that God, who is love, wanted to unite them in the bond of love and make them live for the love of each other. That is how it was in the beginning. And that is how it should be still now. When Jesus came, he made the bond between husbands and wives even more sacred, assuring them of God’s grace. Are people faithful to their yes given in the presence of God and the Church? Let us ask the Lord today for faithfulness and deep, deep love between our married couples – and for all our friendships.

 

First Reading: Genesis 2:18-24

      God said, “It’s not good for the Man to be alone; I’ll make him a helper, a companion.” So God formed from the dirt of the ground all the animals of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the Man to see what he would name them. Whatever the Man called each living creature, that was its name. The Man named the cattle, named the birds of the air, named the wild animals; but he didn’t find a suitable companion.

God put the Man into a deep sleep. As he slept he removed one of his ribs and replaced it with flesh. God then used the rib that he had taken from the Man to make Woman and presented her to the Man.

The Man said,
“Finally! Bone of my bone,
    flesh of my flesh!
Name her Woman
    for she was made from Man.”
    Therefore a man leaves his father and mother and embraces his wife. They become one flesh.
    The two of them, the Man and his Wife, were naked, but they felt no shame.

 

Second reading: Hebrews 2:9-11

God didn’t put angels in charge of this business of salvation that we’re dealing with here. It says in Scripture,

What is man and woman that you bother with them;
    why take a second look their way?
You made them not quite as high as angels,
    bright with Eden’s dawn light;
Then you put them in charge
    of your entire handcrafted world.

When God put them in charge of everything, nothing was excluded. But we don’t see it yet, don’t see everything under human jurisdiction. What we do see is Jesus, made “not quite as high as angels,” and then, through the experience of death, crowned so much higher than any angel, with a glory “bright with Eden’s dawn light.” In that death, by God’s grace, he fully experienced death in every person’s place.

^10-13 It makes good sense that the God who got everything started and keeps everything going now completes the work by making the Salvation Pioneer perfect through suffering as he leads all these people to glory. Since the One who saves and those who are saved have a common origin, Jesus doesn’t hesitate to treat them as family, saying,

I’ll tell my good friends, my brothers and sisters, all I know about you;
I’ll join them in worship and praise to you.

Again, he puts himself in the same family circle when he says,

Even I live by placing my trust in God.

And yet again,

I’m here with the children God gave me.

 

Gospel: Mark 10:2-16 

From there he went to the area of Judea across the Jordan. A crowd of people, as was so often the case, went along, and he, as he so often did, taught them. Pharisees came up, intending to give him a hard time. They asked, “Is it legal for a man to divorce his wife?”

Jesus said, “What did Moses command?”

They answered, “Moses gave permission to fill out a certificate of dismissal and divorce her.”

Jesus said, “Moses wrote this command only as a concession to your hard-hearted ways. In the original creation, God made male and female to be together. Because of this, a man leaves father and mother, and in marriage he becomes one flesh with a woman—no longer two individuals, but forming a new unity. Because God created this organic union of the two sexes, no one should desecrate his art by cutting them apart.”

When they were back home, the disciples brought it up again. Jesus gave it to them straight: “A man who divorces his wife so he can marry someone else commits adultery against her. And a woman who divorces her husband so she can marry someone else commits adultery.”

The people brought children to Jesus, hoping he might touch them. The disciples shooed them off. But Jesus was irate and let them know it: “Don’t push these children away. Don’t ever get between them and me. These children are at the very center of life in the kingdom. Mark this: Unless you accept God’s kingdom in the simplicity of a child, you’ll never get in.” Then, gathering the children up in his arms, he laid his hands of blessing on them.

 

Prayer
God, source of all love,
blessed are you for your tenderness
inscribed in the hearts of people;
blessed are you for giving us your Son
as the token of your faithful love.
Keep us from separating
what you have united:
husbands and wives,
parents and their children,
your Son and his Church,
friends in their joys and sorrows.
Let us all live in your creative, lasting love.
We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen.

 

Reflection:

Treat her as your own flesh!

The first reading recalls what was the beginning of all things. It tells it in a romantic way. Maybe it wasn’t exactly like that, but the most important thing is contained in that story: man and woman met and recognized each other. The look did not stop at the eyes. It reached the heart. Then began a story that lasts to this day. Both felt called to become one flesh, to live united in love.
There are situations in which two spouses wonder if it is still worth insisting on trying to fix a relationship that began badly and is proving to be irreparably broken. They no longer love each other, there are incompatibilities of character, they are mean to each other, speak only to offend…What sense does it make to continue together? Can God demand that we continue living together in a way that is a torment?
Human logic responds without hesitation: divorce is better. When so many couples separate after only a few years of marriage, they ask: Isn’t cohabitation preferable? If things don’t work out, we break up without too many problems.
Many people, including Catholics disagree with the Church on this one issue of divorce. Any priest who speaks of the Church teaching and the indissolubility of marriage soon would be unpopular for them. That was the case with Jesus too.
Mark tells us that the attempt of the Pharisees by raising the question on divorce was a trap to make Jesus unpopular with the crowd. Because the Jewish society practiced divorce as an established norm. Jesus responds in a straightforward and unexpected way. He brings everything back to the beginning, to the beginning of creation, to teach us that God blesses human love, that it is he who joins the hearts of two people who love each other, he who joins them in unity and indissolubility. This shows us that the goal of conjugal life is not simply to live together for life, but to love each other for life! In this way Jesus re-establishes the order which was present from the beginning.
It’s true that there are difficulties in marriage, there are problems with children or with the couple themselves, arguments and fights… It is here, we must understand well the meaning of “becoming one flesh.” In the sacrament, these two individuals have become one flesh. Which means the joys, successes, achievements, of one of them is also joys and achievements of the other. In the same way the illness, pains, sufferings, and failures of one is also the failures and pains of the other. Those in married life, must always remember that your marriage is a silent homily for everyone else, a daily homily.

 

Video available on Youtube: Treat her as your own flesh!