Heart and Actions in Worship

Thank you, FatherJboy for your beautiful reflection on today's Gospel. We truly have to examine ourselves and see if our external actions reflect the state of our hearts. In the same way, we have to ensure that the grace in our hearts flow to our every action. To let God live in us means to have the wholeness of our person, body and soul, be transformed in accordance to who God is, a God whose Holiness cannot co-exist with unholy things.

Jesus, in correcting the scribes in Pharisees, said "These you should have practised, without neglecting the others." Having reminded ourselves of the importance of this, we also should be careful not to let ourselves fall on the other end of the spectrum wherein we forget the externals and confine our concerns with our internal state. To have this view in the extreme erroneously inclines us to reject actions that are the necessary fruit of our Christian transformation. We have to keep in mind Jesus' institution of sacraments, which incorporates rituals, highlights the importance of human actions in our worship. The Church's rules to avoid abuses and illicit activities in celebrating the liturgy is a confirmation of how we should value these externals. The same grace that abides in us, the loving presence of God within us that Jesus foremost requires, naturally moves us to follow these liturgical norms to the best of our ability with charity and prudence.

Man cannot just rely on his personal preference on how to worship. To help us, the Church continually safeguards the norms and liturgical practices to reflect in our human action the reverence that is due to God and to reflect sacredness of such activities. In the Sacraments, one cannot just decide for himself which form and matter should be present to guarantee the sacramental action of God even if one has pure intentions. The Lord, through his Church, has revealed the ordinary ways for worship and to ignore them brings us in a similar predicament as the scribes and Pharisees were. As they have put themselves in danger with their exclusive trust in ritual and laws, we also put ourselves in danger when we let ourselves be satisfied alone with the good intentions and love in our hearts.

That is why it is important to learn the role of Faith in our Christian lives. By faith which is first received in Baptism, God supernaturally transforms us as sons and daughters of God. More than in a legalistic sense as when we are just granted a right to the title of sonship, but greater than this, as everything that God declares turns into reality, our sonship is a reality that integrates our whole humanity to Christ, in mind, heart and action.

All our actions for the love of the Lord. Our Lady of Lourdes, Pray for us