Today’s Reflection
Gospel: Matthew 23: 13-22
August 25, 2025 | Monday

Today’s Gospel

But woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door to the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You, yourselves, do not enter it, nor do you allow others to do so.

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You devour widows’ property; and as a show, you pray long prayers! Therefore, you shall receive greater condemnation. Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel by sea and land to make a single convert; yet, once he is converted, you make him twice as fit for hell as yourselves!

Woe to you, blind guides! You say: To swear by the temple is not binding; but, to swear by the gold of the temple is binding. Foolish men! Blind men! Which is of more worth: the gold in the temple, or the temple which makes the gold a sacred treasure? You say: To swear by the altar is not binding, but to swear by the offering on the altar is binding. How blind you are! Which is of more value: the offering on the altar, or the altar which makes the offering sacred?

Whoever swears by the altar, is swearing by the altar and by everything on it. Whoever swears by the temple, is swearing by the temple, and by God, who dwells in the temple. Whoever swears by heaven, is swearing by the throne of God, and by him, who is seated on it.

Today’s Reflection

Today’s first reading is considered the first to be written in the great Pauline corpus. The pattern is the same as the custom of the day in writing letters. Paul has to sustain and follow up the different churches he has started. He needs to answer their questions on faith, encourage them, even reprimand them, and commend them if they have grown in faith and numbers. It was also a reminder for all of them how precious their received faith was and to continue accordingly and wait for the coming of Christ. And most of all, these efforts are attributed to the power of the Holy Spirit working in them. The effectiveness of their faith is shown by the witness of their lives. All is grace from God!

The first of the many “woes” of Christ. This one focuses on the Scribes and the Pharisees who blindly led the people to perdition. They multiply and interpret laws that a few infringements become scrupulously highlighted, forgetting that they are there to regulate life for the better and not as a canon not to be violated to the detriment of the real worship of God. This accountability is not only for Scribes and the Pharisees; it applies to us, teachers, Christians, theologians, or ordinary people of faith that we have to witness with our lives and not lead people otherwise. Christians of today have the tendency of “accommodation attitude” in their faith. We are demanded by the witness of our lives to proclaim the faith we profess and no compromises and exceptions of any infringements of the different precepts of our faith. More so, we have to tamper our observance of the different precepts with the “law of love” of Christ.

/Vulnerasti, 2025