August 11, 2025
Memorial of Saint Clare, Virgin
Lectionary: 413
Reading 1
Moses said to the people:
"And now, Israel, what does the LORD, your God, ask of you
but to fear the LORD, your God, and follow his ways exactly,
to love and serve the LORD, your God,
with all your heart and all your soul,
to keep the commandments and statutes of the LORD
which I enjoin on you today for your own good?
Think! The heavens, even the highest heavens,
belong to the LORD, your God,
as well as the earth and everything on it.
Yet in his love for your fathers the LORD was so attached to them
as to choose you, their descendants,
in preference to all other peoples, as indeed he has now done.
Circumcise your hearts, therefore, and be no longer stiff-necked.
For the LORD, your God, is the God of gods,
the LORD of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome,
who has no favorites, accepts no bribes;
who executes justice for the orphan and the widow,
and befriends the alien, feeding and clothing him.
So you too must befriend the alien,
for you were once aliens yourselves in the land of Egypt.
The LORD, your God, shall you fear, and him shall you serve;
hold fast to him and swear by his name.
He is your glory, he, your God,
who has done for you those great and terrible things
which your own eyes have seen.
Your ancestors went down to Egypt seventy strong,
and now the LORD, your God,
has made you as numerous as the stars of the sky."
Responsorial Psalm
R. (12a) Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
Glorify the LORD, O Jerusalem;
praise your God, O Zion.
For he has strengthened the bars of your gates;
he has blessed your children within you.
R. Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
He has granted peace in your borders;
with the best of wheat he fills you.
He sends forth his command to the earth;
swiftly runs his word!
R. Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
He has proclaimed his word to Jacob,
his statutes and his ordinances to Israel.
He has not done thus for any other nation;
his ordinances he has not made known to them. Alleluia.
R. Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
God has called you through the Gospel
to possess the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
As Jesus and his disciples were gathering in Galilee,
Jesus said to them,
"The Son of Man is to be handed over to men,
and they will kill him, and he will be raised on the third day."
And they were overwhelmed with grief.
When they came to Capernaum,
the collectors of the temple tax approached Peter and said,
"Does not your teacher pay the temple tax?"
"Yes," he said.
When he came into the house, before he had time to speak,
Jesus asked him, "What is your opinion, Simon?
From whom do the kings of the earth take tolls or census tax?
From their subjects or from foreigners?"
When he said, "From foreigners," Jesus said to him,
"Then the subjects are exempt.
But that we may not offend them, go to the sea, drop in a hook,
and take the first fish that comes up.
Open its mouth and you will find a coin worth twice the temple tax.
Give that to them for me and for you."
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/081125.cfm
Commentary on
Deuteronomy 10:12-22
Our reading again comes from the second of the three
discourses of Moses which form the major part of Deuteronomy. Today’s passage
comes from the last part of the discourse. It is a beautiful call for the
people of Israel to be filled with the very spirit of their God.
Moses’ question to the people is:
…what does the Lord your God require of you?
He himself gives the beautiful answer:
Only to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways,
to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your
soul, and to keep the commandments of the Lord and his decrees that I am
commanding you today, for your own well-being.
He tells them that they are living in a world where
everything above, on and below the earth belongs to Yahweh and comes from him:
…heaven and the heaven of heavens belong to the Lord your
God, the earth with all that is in it…
“Heaven of heavens” is a Hebrew superlative meaning the
highest of heavens.
Yet, out of all he has made in his mysterious ways, the Lord
“set his heart in love on your ancestors alone”.
He chose their ancestors to be his own in a special way.
This love extends to their descendants down to the present day.
The sign of their belonging to God is their circumcision,
but they must go further and circumcise their hearts and be resistant to the
Lord’s call no longer. Circumcision was the outer sign of belonging to God’s
people, but that was not enough. The bonding must reach deep down into the
heart. It cannot stop at a merely external physical badge; membership brings
spiritual obligations with it.
So, Jeremiah says:
Circumcise yourselves to the Lord;
remove the foreskin of your hearts… (Jer 4:4)
The “uncircumcised” heart is closed and unreceptive to God’s
grace and guidance. Elsewhere the Scripture speaks also of “uncircumcised” ears
(Jer 6:10) which are closed to the voice of God and “uncircumcised” lips, which
do not speak well.
Moses then gives a wonderful description of God:
…the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the
great God, mighty and awesome, who is not partial and takes no bribe, who
executes justice for the orphan and the widow, and who loves the strangers,
providing them food and clothing.
So the Israelites must imitate their God in loving the
stranger, because they themselves were once strangers in Egypt. Here, God asks
them to extend their concern beyond their own people.
Their total allegiance must be to this God. He is the one
they must fear and serve; to him they must hold firm; in his name only will
they make their oaths. He is the one they must praise, the one who did these
great and terrible things of which they themselves were witnesses. This can
refer to all the wonders that happened before they left Egypt, the happenings
at Mount Sinai and the many other signs of God’s power they experienced in
their 40 years of wanderings.
And although their ancestors—Jacob and his family—were only
70 persons when they went down to Egypt (as described at the end of Genesis),
their numbers are now as many as “the stars in heaven”, thus fulfilling the
promise made so long ago to Abraham when his wife was still barren and he had
no heir and no prospect of one. Moses is emphasising that their being God’s
chosen people is not just a privilege to be exploited, but a responsibility
which calls for even greater accountability.
We are moving now into the spirituality of the prophets. In
the earlier times of hardship, the Israelites were more concerned with justice
for themselves and looking for the end of a life of suffering. Now, with better
times, they can begin to look around them, because with better times—as so
often happens—comes social inequality.
The emphasis, too, on loving God is moving from focusing on
God alone and the observance of law to a greater sensitivity to the needs of
those around us, including the total stranger and the outsider. The Gospel will
make it abundantly clear that there can be no love of God which does not
include loving other people.
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Commentary on
Matthew 17:22-27
For the second time Jesus warns his disciples about what is
to come: his suffering, death and resurrection. Once again the word ‘delivered’
or ‘handed over’ (Greek, emiparadidomi) is used. It is a refrain
running right through the Gospel—applied to John the Baptist, to Jesus, to the
disciples, and to the giving of the Body of Christ in the Eucharist.
We are told that the disciples are overwhelmed with grief
over what Jesus says. Whether that is purely out of sorrow for Jesus, or
whether it represents their disillusionment, is hard to say. This was not the
kind of end they were expecting to the coming of the Messiah.
The second part of today’s reading is a peculiar scene, only
to be found in Matthew. The collectors of the temple tax want to know whether
Jesus pays it or not. Peter assures them that he does.
But on entering the house (there is that anonymous ‘house’
again, which seems to symbolise the Church or the Christian community), Jesus
asks Peter (though, interestingly, he calls him by his old name ‘Simon’):
What do you think, Simon? From whom do kings of the earth
take toll or tribute? From their children or from others?
In other words, from whom do they collect taxes, from their
subjects, or from foreigners? Peter replies:
From others…
And, in fact, the Romans did collect taxes from their
colonised peoples and not from their own citizens.
In that case, Jesus says, the sons—that is, he and his
disciples—should be exempt from paying the temple tax. After all, the Temple is
God’s house, and Jesus is his Son, and his disciples are his brothers, sons of
the same Father.
But to avoid giving scandal and misunderstanding, Peter is
told to catch a fish in whose mouth he will find a shekel, enough to pay taxes
for both of them. A half shekel was levied each year on all Jewish males of 20
years or older. It was for the upkeep of the Temple. A half shekel at this time
was roughly equivalent to two days’ wages.
This passage seems to reflect a dilemma of the early Church,
in fact, a double dilemma. Should Christians who are Jews continue to pay the
temple tax? And, should Christians in general have to pay tax to a pagan
government, especially one whose emperor claims to be a deity?
The first dilemma solved itself in time, especially with the
destruction of the Temple (which had already taken place when Matthew’s Gospel
was written). The second dilemma took longer. The problem seems to have been
solved by the principle laid down elsewhere by Jesus:
Give therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and
to God the things that are God’s. (Matt 22:21)
We too have to discern what is legitimately required of us
by our governments and make our contribution to the needs of our society while,
at the same time, not compromising on issues where universal principles of
truth and justice are at stake. Civil disobedience is sometimes not only a right,
but also a responsibility.
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https://livingspace.sacredspace.ie/o1192g/
Monday, August 11,
2025
Opening Prayer
Almighty and ever-living God, your
Spirit made us your children, confident to call you Father.
Increase your Spirit within us
and bring us to our promised inheritance.
We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives
and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Gospel Reading - Matthew 17: 22-27
When they were together in Galilee, Jesus
said to them, 'The Son of man is going to be delivered into the power of men;
they will put him to death, and on the third day he will be raised up again.'
And a great sadness came over them. When they reached Capernaum, the collectors
of the half-shekel came to Peter and said, 'Does your master not pay the
half-shekel?' 'Yes,' he replied, and went into the house. But before he could
speak, Jesus said, 'Simon, what is your opinion? From whom do earthly kings
take toll or tribute? From their sons or from foreigners?' And when he replied,
'From foreigners,' Jesus said, 'Well then, the sons are exempt. However, so
that we shall not be the downfall of others, go to the lake and cast a hook;
take the first fish that rises, open its mouth and there you will find a
shekel; take it and give it to them for me and for yourself.'
Reflection
The five verses of today’s Gospel
speak about two very different themes between them. (a) The second announcement
of the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus (Mt 17: 22-23); (b) they inform
on the conversation of Jesus with Peter about paying the taxes and the dues to
the temple (Mt 17: 24-27). • Matthew
17: 22-23: The announcement of the death
and resurrection of Jesus. The first announcement (Mt 16: 21) had produced
a strong reaction on Peter who did not want to know anything about suffering
nor the cross. Jesus had answered just as strongly: “Get behind me, Satan!” (Mt 16: 23). Here, in the second
announcement, the reaction of the disciples is less strong, less aggressive.
The announcement produces sadness. It seems that now they begin to understand
that the cross forms part of the journey. The proximity of the death and the
suffering weigh heavily on them, giving rise to a great discouragement. Even if
Jesus tries to help them, the resistance of centuries against the idea of a
crucified Messiah, was much greater.
•
Matthew 17: 24-25a: The question which the tax collectors ask Peter concerning the taxes. When
they reached Capernaum, the tax collector of the taxes of the Temple asks
Peter: “Does your Master not pay the half-shekel for the Temple?” Peter
answered: “Yes.” From the time of Nehemias (V Century BC), the Jews who had
returned from the exile of Babylonia, committed themselves solemnly in the
Assembly to pay the diverse taxes and dues in order to allow the Temple to
continue to function and to take care of the maintenance both of the priestly
service and of the building of the Temple. (Ne 10: 33-40). From what we can see
from Peter’s response, Jesus paid the taxes like any other Jew.
•
Matthew 17: 25b-26: The question of Jesus to
Peter concerning the taxes. The conversation between Jesus and Peter is very
strange. When they reach home, Jesus asked: “Simon, what is your opinion? From
whom do earthly kings take toll or tribute? From their sons or from
foreigners?” Peter responds: “From foreigners.” And Jesus says: “Therefore, the
sons are exempt!” Probably, here we can see a discussion between the Christian
Jews before the destruction of the Temple, in the year 70. They asked
themselves if they had to continue or not to pay the taxes of the Temple, as
they did before. By Jesus’ response they discover that they are not obliged to
pay this tax: “The sons are exempt!” The sons are the Christians, but even if
they are not obliged to pay, the recommendation of Jesus is to pay in order not
to cause scandal.
•
Matthew 17: 27: The conclusion of the conversation on the paying of the tax.
The solution which Jesus gives to this situation is even
stranger. He tells Peter: “However, so
that we shall not be the downfall of others, go to the lake and cast a hook:
take the first fish that rises, open its mouth and there you will find a
shekel; take it and give it to them for me and for yourself.” This was a
strange miracle, strange like that of the 2000 pigs which threw themselves into
the sea (Mk 5: 13). Whichever is the interpretation of this miraculous fact,
this way of resolving the problem suggests that it is a question that is not
too important for Jesus.
Personal Questions
•
The suffering of the Cross discourages and
saddens the disciples. Has this already happened in your life?
•
How do you interpret the episode of the coin
found in the mouth of the fish?
Concluding Prayer
Praise Yahweh from the heavens, praise him in the heights.
Praise him, all his angels, praise him, all his host!
(Ps 148: 1-2)
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