XX SUNDAY, year A

Isaiah 56: 1; 6-7:

A house of prayer for all peoples

Jesus quoted this passage of Isaiah to justify his action, when he expelled the vendors from the Temple (Mt 21:13). And this passage helps us to find the meaning of Jesus’ action in the Temple and also of the encounter of Jesus with the Canaanite woman.

The religious establishment was conservative, puritan, discriminating and exclusivist. No gentile and no uncircumcised the inner court of the Temple, and the impure, the handicapped and the sinners suffered the same exclusion. Paul’s life was put at risk when he was suspected of entering the Temple with gentiles (Act 21:28). The Pharisees – which means the separated ones – were called so, because, in their effort to be pious, faithful and pure, separated themselves from the sinners. Jesus’ intervention in the Temple was a protest at exclusivism and separation. And that is the message of Isaiah. A time will come when nobody will be excluded. All those “who join themselves to the Lord, to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants”, “I will bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer”.

All those who choose to live by faith and who are ready to follow and serve the Lord with love, will be accepted and will rejoice in the presence of the Lord.