The Church: Family or Business?

(Homily for November 5^th, 2023)

Let me make a commentary on the first reading (Malachi 1:14b-2:2b, 8-10). I hope these reflections help us to better understand our Church and our different roles in it.

“And now, O priests, this commandment is for you.” The fact that he is a priest does not mean that he does not have a boss. The priest has authority but his authority is not absolute. He is a father, but not the Father. The priest is not “another” father of God’s people: the only Father of God’s people is God himself. Instead, the priest is father under the Father, the priest is father in the Father.

“And now, O priests, this commandment is for you.” What is this commandment? It is “to give glory to my name, says the LORD of hosts.” In the Gospel, the pharisees and the scribes used their God-given authority for their own benefit, to give glory to their own name. They loved to be greeted by people on the streets and to be called “Rabbi” by the people.

In a similar way, the priests about whom Malachi is talking about have failed to glorify God. The prophet says to them: “You have turned aside from the way, and have caused many to falter by your instruction.” The priests’ job was to glorify God with their lives and with their instruction. Instead, they profaned the name of the Lord with their sins and they led astray God’s people by their bad example and with their wrong instruction.

There is a future punishment with which God threatens those priests: “I will send a curse upon you and of your blessing I will make a curse” but, most interestingly, there is a present punishment which is like a consequence of their bad actions. The Lord says, “I, therefore, have made you contemptible and base before all the people, since you do not keep my ways, but show partiality in your decisions.” The punishment of those priests is that everybody despises them: those who are good, because they try to stay away from priests who do not serve the Lord with their actions and whose doctrine is wrong; but even those who do evil despise these priests, because they realized that these priests do not have any moral authority against their own evil deeds. Actually, bad priests, in order to obtain the vain glory they are looking for, must tell the sinner what the sinner wants to hear... and the sinner knows this. This is why even the sinner despises bad priests. For the sinner, the bad priest is like a puppet.

You may think, “Why is he saying all these things? We are not priests.” There is a line in which the Lord says to those priests, “you have caused many to falter by your instruction.” The many who falter were also guilty: the fact that their priests were bad did not take away their responsibility. Sometimes the priest is bad but he teaches the right thing: in this case, the Lord says in today’s Gospel: “do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you, but do not follow their example.” Other times, the priest is bad and he also teaches the wrong thing: in this case, I am still responsible for my own sins, that is, for those evil deeds which I know that are wrong. I cannot blame someone else for my own sins. I cannot justify my own sins by saying that the leaders of the Church are sinners. The people of God has always been led by humans, and many of these humans have sinned: this is what we read in the Scriptures. This fact, however, does not take away our responsibility to do the right thing. Leaders, however, are more responsible, and this is why their punishment will be worse.

The text finishes beautifully. The prophet says to the priest, “Have we not all the one father? Has not the one God created us?” As if the prophet were saying to the priest, “Do you not realize that God, who created this people to be His own, took you, priest, from among your brothers and sisters to share His authority over them with you? Don’t you realize that you are all one family and that you are for them as they are for you?” The prophet continues, “Why then do we break faith with one another, violating the covenant of our fathers?” The priest must be faithful to God’s people like a husband to his wife. Husband and wife are equal partners. True, the priest is constituted in authority over the people: however, because his authority depends on God’s authority, he must respect God’s terms. The priest cannot break God’s covenant. The people of God has the right to be taught and served by the priests, in those things related to God’s law and worship. What is beautiful is that, even if the prophet is presupposing the priests’ authority over the people, he speaks of the sin of priests as if the priests were breaking a covenant with the people, not only with God.

The Church is not a business in which each person relates to the other only to get what they want. The Church is not a business in which I complain when I don’t get the service I expect. The Church is like a family. We all have rights and responsibilities towards each other. Rights and responsibilities are different for each member of the family. However, we all can expect something from each other, and none of us can blame on others our own responsibility. It might seem difficult to understand, but it would be easier to live out if we just loved one another as Jesus commanded us to do. May God help us to grow in love, in service and in true concern for each other.