Homily: 19 February 2021: Matthew 9:14-15

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Please read the passage before reading the homily

It was a question of fasting.  It came from a friendly source, the disciples of John.  They were an influential group of people in the early days of the Church.  They seemed to have fasted very frequently, much more than did the Christians of Matthew’s time.

In Jewish literature at the time of Matthew’s Gospel, the bridegroom was God.  It was God who dated, courted and wooed the people of God.  So long as God was among the people, the people would not fast.  When God departed, then was the time to fast.

The fasting of John’s disciples was a fasting of waiting for the Bridegroom, God.  The lack of fasting among the Christians was acknowledging that Jesus, God, was near, for many of them expected the second coming to happen soon.

So, why do we fast?  Yes, God is with us in Christ in the Church, and we cannot forget this.  Yet, we still live in an in-between time after the Resurrection and before the Second Coming.  Our fasting, then, is a sign that we await the Second Coming.

How do we fast, is another question.  It is not so much a fasting from food as a fasting from our selfishness.  We should fast so that others can feast.  Our world abounds in homelessness from our southern borders to the alleys of our cities: how do we house them?  Our world abounds in hunger on all continents: how do we feed them?  Our world abounds in nakedness, oppression, incarceration, especially among the marginalized, the poorly educated and those in impoverished conditions: how do we clothe them, relieve them of their burdens and free them so they can live in liberty?  Isaiah is an excellent teacher about fasting.

In this between time, as we await the return of the Lord Jesus and prepare to celebrate the anniversary of our baptism, let us fast so these others can feast.  Then we shall recognize the presence of the divine Bridegroom in our presence.