20150121 OPEN-MINDEDNESS LIES BETWEEN A CLOSED AND AN OPEN MIND
Readings at Mass
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First reading
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Hebrews
7:1-3,15-17 ©
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You remember that Melchizedek,
king of Salem, a priest of God Most High, went to meet Abraham who was on his
way back after defeating the kings, and blessed him; and also that
it was to him that Abraham gave a tenth of all that he had. By the
interpretation of his name, he is, first, ‘king of righteousness’ and also king
of Salem, that is, ‘king of peace’; he has no father, mother or ancestry,
and his life has no beginning or ending; he is like the Son of God. He remains
a priest for ever.
This
becomes even more clearly evident when there appears a second Melchizedek, who
is a priest not by virtue of a law about physical descent, but by the power of
an indestructible life. For it was about him that the prophecy was made: You
are a priest of the order of Melchizedek, and for ever.
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Psalm
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Psalm 109:1-4 ©
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You are a priest
for ever, a priest like Melchizedek of old.
The Lord’s revelation
to my Master:
‘Sit on
my right:
your foes
I will put beneath your feet.’
You are a priest
for ever, a priest like Melchizedek of old.
The Lord will wield
from Zion
your
sceptre of power:
rule in
the midst of all your foes.
You are a priest
for ever, a priest like Melchizedek of old.
A prince from the day
of your birth
on the
holy mountains;
from the
womb before the dawn I begot you.
You are a priest
for ever, a priest like Melchizedek of old.
The Lord has sworn an
oath he will not change.
‘You are
a priest for ever,
a priest
like Melchizedek of old.’
You are a priest
for ever, a priest like Melchizedek of old.
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Gospel Acclamation
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Heb4:12
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Alleluia, alleluia!
The word of God is
something alive and active:
it can judge secret
emotions and thoughts.
Alleluia!
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Or
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cf.Mt4:23
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Alleluia, alleluia!
Jesus proclaimed the
Good News of the kingdom
and cured all kinds
of sickness among the people.
Alleluia!
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Gospel
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Mark 3:1-6 ©
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Jesus
went again into a synagogue, and there was a man there who had a withered hand.
And they were watching him to see if he would cure him on the sabbath day,
hoping for something to use against him. He said to the man with the withered
hand, ‘Stand up out in the middle!’ Then he said to them, ‘Is it against the
law on the sabbath day to do good, or to do evil; to save life, or to kill?’
But they said nothing. Then, grieved to find them so obstinate, he looked
angrily round at them, and said to the man, ‘Stretch out your hand.’ He
stretched it out and his hand was better. The Pharisees went out and at once
began to plot with the Herodians against him, discussing how to destroy him.
OPEN-MINDEDNESS
LIES BETWEEN A CLOSED AND AN OPEN MIND
SCRIPTURE
READINGS: HEB 7:1-3, 15-17; MK3:1-6
At the
beginning of the year, it is appropriate that the Church calls us to mind the
importance of keeping an open mind towards life and its challenges.
Without this right frame of mind, we will be missing out the newness of life
that the new year is offering us. The tragedy of having a closed mind
is the gist of the message of today’s gospel reading.
What does it mean to
have a closed mind?
To have a closed mind simply means to be focused only on one thing in
life. The example highlighted to us today is that of the mindset of the
Pharisees. For them, we know that they were obsessed with the exact
performance of the laws. However, we should not doubt their sincerity,
for they really believed that the way to win God’s favour was by carrying out
the laws to the exact letter. So to be closed-minded is simply to focus
only on one aspect of life. In their case, it is to presume that legalism
is the way of spiritual progress.
In contrast, we have Jesus who surely had
high regard for the laws, yet the laws were not absolute to Him.
He wanted to go beyond the laws to the spirit of the laws. His concern,
as the gospel tells us, was to preserve life at any cost, even if it meant
breaking the sacred laws of Moses. Thus, when the Pharisees became
hostile towards Jesus, it was only because Jesus personified the law-breaker
and therefore a threat to their very foundation of religious belief and life.
For this reason, we are
told in the gospel that they were always on the lookout for occasions to
incriminate Jesus. Three times in the gospel, the evangelist in
different ways described the fixated views of the Pharisees. They were
keeping an eye on Jesus to see whether He would heal on the Sabbath. And
Jesus was deeply grieved that they had closed their minds to Him. And
finally, the Pharisees even plotted with the Herodians to get rid of Jesus.
Now what was tragic about
the Pharisees is that their obsession with the laws prevented them from
seeing other things in life. So tragic was their attitude that the gospel
described Jesus as angry and deeply grieved when they remained silent to the
question posed by Jesus: “Is it permitted to do a good deed on the
Sabbath – or an evil one? To preserve life or to destroy it?” Of
course, we know the answer is obvious. Yet, one might wonder how the
Pharisees could not respond to Jesus’ defence of His action.
The truth is that when
one is closed-minded, one cannot hear or see anything else except what one
wants to see. In this instance, their pre-occupation with defending
the laws of Moses prevented them from seeing that there was someone before them
who needed help. Thus, they did not hear the question of Jesus. I
suppose for this reason, they remained silent, because if they had really heard
Jesus, then their minds would no longer have been closed. And if they had
heard, they would surely have understood the expedient action of Jesus.
This is also very true in
our own situation. Isn’t it a fact that when we fall in love with
someone, we can only see the goodness of that person? Conversely, when we
do not like someone, we find it extremely difficult to see any goodness
whatsoever in that person. We can extend this same tendency even to the
way we perceive things or situations. When we like something, we will find
all the reasons why we should do it. But when we do not like something,
we can find all the reasons for not doing what we are supposed to do. So
we can conclude that to be closed-minded is to focus on something or someone
to the exclusion of others.
Does it mean then, that
to be open-minded we should not focus on anything in particular? In other words, is an open mind
a kind of tabula rasa, a blank cheque, so to speak? If that were so, then
being open-minded would be as good as being fickle, indifferent and spineless.
One can even fall into relativism and irresponsibility. But we know that
Jesus, although open-minded in His outlook, was never aimless nor a
scatter-brain.
So what do we really
mean when we say that one should be open-minded? It means that we
must be fully focused on the situation at any point of time. It is to
give our full attention to what is the reality before us. Thus, for
Jesus, at that point of time, the man with the shriveled hand was in need of
His attention. He devoted His entire energy to Him, setting the sacred
laws of Moses aside. For Jesus, every situation demands the appropriate
response. Laws and guidelines are good but they must be modified
according to the peculiar circumstances.
Consequently, we can
conclude that a person who is truly open-minded is one who is neither closed
nor so open that he loses his perspective. A truly open-minded person
is one who is open to every situation but in a particular situation, he is so
focused that it becomes everything to him even though it is only for that
moment in time. But once the situation is over, he is open to all
situations again. Thus, we can put it in another way. An
open-minded person is one who is totally open to reality, both in a general and
in a particular way.
In Jesus we find just such
a person. The letter to the Hebrews, which speaks about the eternal
priesthood of Jesus, is to remind us that Jesus is available to one and
all. He is totally personal to each one of us and yet He does not belong
to anyone of us in particular. He is totally available and yet cannot be
possessed by anyone. This is true celibacy and true love.
WRITTEN BY THE MOST REV
WILLIAM GOH
ARCHBISHOP
OF SINGAPORE
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
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