The Cleansing of the Temple

Today's Reflections

                                                                                 

 

The Cleansing of the Temple

Lk 19:45-48

⁴⁵Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, ⁴⁶saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.’ ” ⁴⁷And every day he was teaching in the temple area. The chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people, meanwhile, were seeking to put him to death, ⁴⁸but they could find no way to accomplish their purpose because all the people were hanging on his words.

TEACHING IN THE TEMPLE AREA. Jesus’ act of cleansing the temple area fulfills what the prophet Zechariah once foretold about the signs of the coming of the Messiah: “No longer will there be merchants in the house of the Lord of hosts on that day” (Zec 14:21c).

This is an affirmation that indeed Jesus is the Messiah. And there are other details the Gospel tells us. The cleansing is not just eliminating the wrong practices in the temple: driving out the merchants, preventing them from becoming thieves. Jesus emphasizes that the temple must become a house of prayer; he teaches the people every day in the temple, a powerful teaching about the loving Father that those (the chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people) who try to kill him do not succeed because the people accept his teachings.

Celebrating the Presentation of Mary, we honor Mary as the one who ushers in the Messiah in her life. Her life has become a house of prayer, also because of her honest and complete trust in the word of God. Through her, Jesus has grown to be a wise and loving Teacher.

“Whoever loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him,

and we will come to him and make our dwelling with him” (Jn 14:23).