Mercy not Sacrifice

WORD 2day: Friday, 13th week in Ordinary time

July 7, 2023 - Genesis 22: 1-19; Matthew 9: 1-8

Mercy and Sacrifice actually stood for two paradigms that were in confrontation as a result of Jesus' life and teaching. God and one's relationship to God was explained purely in terms of sacrifice, sacrifice which stood for fulfillment of the requirements based on regulations and customs. The challenge is alive even today - that we do not make our spirituality a sacrifice-based spirituality. Fulfillment of the precepts, keeping the commandments, making vows and carrying out the same, offering suffrages and being faithful to our prayers to be 'said'. 

Mercy, instead, is fundamentally a relationship. The Scripture scholars attribute the meaning from the Hebrew word for mercy - rahamim (or rachamim) which comes from the root, rehem (or rechem) which means "womb". Biblically, as Jesus uses, mercy refers to a compassion that one feels to a child in the womb or a bond very intimate that arouses a warm feeling towards the other! 

Far from doing something to help the other or giving something to someone in need, Mercy is to feel one with the other, specially someone who is in real need. That is why the statement of Jesus: I have come not to call the righteous but the sinners - a feeling one with the needy! When we really feel one with someone in trouble, or difficulty, or temptation, or a struggle, much before branding that person a 'sinner' or a 'weakling' or a 'traitor' or a 'infidel', we would stay close to him or her, find out what actually is going on and share moments of solidarity that would walk that person right out of that situation. 

That is what Jesus did and that is what he expects of you and me - to go and learn what it means... Mercy not Sarifice!