Clean Our Hands

A Reflection on the Gospel for August 29th, 2021:
Twenty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

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Mark
7.1-8, 14-15, 21-23

When the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus, they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders; and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles. So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?”

Jesus said to them, “Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, ‘This people honours me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.’ You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.”

Then Jesus called the crowd again and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile them, but the things that come out of a person are what defile them.

“For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”
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I sometimes live — act, behave — out of my brokenness. The things that come from within sometimes defile me — and I find myself wondering how they got there. 

As I grow into my identity as a daughter of God, I see more and more the ways in which I have been, and continue to be, encouraged by the norms of society and by people around me, to embrace evil intentions. I also see the ways in which the purity of my heart has been wounded, either by others or by my own actions, and evil intentions have sprung up from those wounds. 

I believe that, as Jesus says here, none of these societal norms or heart wounds have defiled me in and of themselves. What strikes me is that even though there was a long time when I didn’t know it, what to do with these things is ultimately a choice that belongs to me.  

But if I were to stop there, I would easily become overwhelmed! Some heart wounds, some bodily wounds, some events of my life and the lives of those around me, have effects that seem so far beyond our control that it seems almost ridiculous that we have any choice in the matter. Even still, I said I believe the choice belongs to me, and that is true.

I believe this because of the clue that Jesus gives us here as He quotes the prophet Isaiah: “This people honours me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me; in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.” 

Whether I bring my heart near to Him is ultimately a choice that belongs to me. Whether to bring Him my pain, my guilt, my shame, my anger, my hopelessness, my fear, and even my joy, is a choice that belongs to me. 

It is our choice whether to bring to Him the injustice, suffering, and violence we witness and experience as we go about our lives. He can handle it — indeed, He can change our perspective, He can lend us strength, He can send us people to help us and even to speak to us on His behalf. 

He can heal our hearts, and He can clean our hands.




​Lindsay Elford
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