Third Sunday in Lent

Third Sunday in Lent

1.Originally, the Israelites did not have a temple. When they first settled in the promised land,
the village Levites would build altars on hill tops and offer sacrifices to God from there
The first temple was built by Solomon, around 10 centuries BC to be the house of God on earth. The Jews
believed that the central room of the temple, the holiest of holies, was Gods room. There they kept the ark
of the alliance, Gods throne on earth.
Eventually under king Josiah, about 6 centuries before Christ, sacrificing on high places was forbidden and
the worship of the whole country was centralized at the temple in Jerusalem. Every Israelite male over the
age of 20 was expected to make 3 pilgrimages to the temple every year and to pay a temple tax equivalent
to 10% of their yearly income (tithing)
Solomons temple was destroyed by the Babylonians, then a second temple was built after the Babylonian
exile, and, just before the times of Jesus, king Herod the great built major additions to the temple and
renovated it.
With 10% of the nation wealth flowing to the temple every year, the temple was not just the center of
religious power in Israel, but, also the largest business in the country.

2.Under the Romans, the Jews were not allowed to mint their own coins, so, the temple tax was
paid in Tyrean shekels, a coin minted in the Lebanese city of Tyre.
These were the coins with the highest silver content, and the temple would not accept any other currency.
Unfortunately Tyrean coins had images carved on them, which was a violation of the second commandment,
but the priests were willing to compromise to get the high silver content
The Jews coming in pilgrimage to Jerusalem from all over the world, did not carry Tyrean shekels, so to pay
the temple tax, or to buy animals to be sacrificed, they availed themselves of money changers at the
temple to exchange their home currency into Tyrean shekels, the only currency accepted by the temple
This created an opportunity for the priestly families, who controlled all the top religious offices in Israel, to
get into the business of currency exchange (money changers),or, in modern terms, to be bankers.
The currency exchange profits were huge. That is what prompted Jesus to state, you have turned the
house of God into a den of thieves, or, in Johns version of the story, stop making my Fathers house into a
marketplace

Third Sunday in Lent

3. The Gospel of John places this episode of the purification of the Temple at the beginning of
Jesus public ministry, while the narrative of the other 3 Gospels places it at the end of his
life
Logically, it seems to belong at the end, because with this attack on the temple business, Jesus entered
into direct conflict with the high priests and with the Sadducees, the leading business families in Israel.
These people did not mind firebrand preachers, as long as they stayed clear of their economic interests,
but when Jesus started to threaten their economic power, he signed his own death sentence: they
immediately told the Romans that Jesus was trying to make himself king and start a revolution, and the
Romans executed him.
Note that any other Jewish firebrand would have accused the high priest of violating the law of Moses by
using coins with images of foreign gods. Jesus did not seem to care all that much about the images on the
coins. He was concerned that the common people were being robbed by their religious leaders, and that
the House of God was being contaminated by their actions.

4. At this point, there is a shift in the Gospel narrative: Jesus refers to himself as a Temple and
predicts that he will be destroyed and then come back to life in 3 days
This must have caused a great deal of confusion in his audience. They thought he was referring to the
temple, and to the renovations done under king Herod, that took 46 years to complete. But Jesus was
talking about himself, his upcoming execution, burial and resurrection.
We need to keep in mind that the Gospel of John was written around 90 AD, some 60 years after Jesus
death and resurrection. In 70 AD, the temple of Jerusalem was indeed destroyed and burned down by the
Romans, following a Jewish revolt against the Roman Empire.
Furthermore, during these 60 years, the church had taken roots and the readers of the Gospel of John
believed that Jesus was the son of God, and as such Jesus was God on earth. So, for them, the presence of
God among his people was not the stone temple but the person of Jesus

5. This is the third Sunday in Lent, and the church is proposing these readings to us to remind
us of these episodes at the end of Jesus life and of the impact they have had and continue
to have
In todays Gospel we find a harsh condemnation of the business practices of religious leaders. We could
just sit back and say, well, this is about how Jews ran their religion 2,000 years ago.

Third Sunday in Lent

But I think this is an ongoing warning of the dangerous mix of money and religion in any age. There
have been people who profited from religion in any age and in any country, and there still are. If, on
the one hand a worker (even a priest or a minister) is entitled to a fair wage, on the other hand we
see preachers and, particularly in this country, we see televangelists enriching themselves ad
building multimillion dollar businesses on the religious believes of the poor.
Is that Christianity? What would Jesus say? Jesus did not object to paying the temple tax. He
himself paid the temple tax, and participated in temple worship, and did not object to the priests
getting paid. When Jesus sent out his disciples he said laborers are entitled to their wages

6. Money has always been collected in the church. Early Christian communities shared
all their resources.
Paul collected money from his Gentile churches to support the church of Jerusalem that was
impoverished . The Diaconate was established specifically to put some honest and respected people
in charge of distributing food and money to widows and orphans. My point is that the issue is not
money in the church, but the appropriate and inappropriate use of money. Jesus condemned abuse.
Last week I attended the convention, and one of the topics was money: the funding of several new
initiatives. Money is necessary, but, above all, we need to remember that religion is about love of
God and love of neighbor: not about love of money, not about building financial empires.
By nature we all tend to be greedy, and so we need to remain vigilant on how we use resources that
are meant to honor God and to help the poor. The rest in in the hands of God.

7. In the letter to the Corinthians, Paul says that Gods plan contradicts human notions of
power and wisdom. In fact, Jesuss passion and death confuse the wise and the strong
because Gods work is not based on human intelligence, or human power, or money.
Jesus suffering and death shocked all those who expected the Messiah to be a political and military
leader. Yet with his passion and death Jesus achieved Gods purpose.
Here is a lesson for us: I have great hopes that we can grow St. James and make it larger and
stronger, but, I wonder, if we were to win the lottery, would we become a better church? The
readings today remind us that even though God calls us to do our best, ultimately, we must learn that
God triumphs when we dont rely on money, power or even our abilities but when we learn to rely on
God.