The Law ~ Msgr. Daniel Hoye

The past few days we’ve been reading from Mark’s Gospel and hearing about the tension between Jesus and the Pharisees about the observance of the law.  We had them picking grains yesterday, and today it’s the healing of the man with a withered hand.

The Pharisees would be what we would call absolute absolutism.  In other words, the law has to be followed right to the letter—no ifs, ands, or buts.  The opposite of that would be absolute relativism—meaning nothing is really important enough to observe.  The truth probably rests somewhere in between.

St. Ignatius, in his Spiritual Exercises, talks about laws being creatures; they’re not God’s, they’re creatures.  Creatures ought to be used if they help us to become what we are called to be, and they should be ignored if they take us away from what we are called to be.  That would be a principle that makes sense, and might help guide us in this maze that we call life.