Friday 17th August, 2012
Day of penance. Ezekiel 16:1–15, 60, 63. You have turned from your anger to comfort me. Isaiah 12:2–6. Matthew 19:3–12.

  
Meditation: mp3 | podcast
Readings: Text | mp3 | podcast

‘They are no longer two but one body.’

Jesus, in his narrative on divorce, is talking to people of a culture and period of history very different from ours. This passage may thus appear cold and demanding for us reading it today. Our God is not so much a God of demands as a Father who gives and blesses.

From the beginning God has always wanted to give those who marry the fulness of life in their relationship with each other. When we start doing away with this, we are going our own way and playing God. Every marriage goes through struggles and hardships, but it is during these times—as the Israelites discovered—that God comes closest to us. When divorce or separation does occur, let us leave that to God’s mercy and to his care of the world.