9/2/18: 22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time: Making the Faith Interior (a.k.a. How to Avoid Being a White-Washed Tomb)

As we return to our Sunday Gospels from the Book of Mark, we see a very familiar scene: a confrontation between Jesus and the scribes and Pharisees. Out of any group of people in the Gospels, Jesus is most critical of this group. Why? Because they are extremely concerned with the exterior following of the Law -- which is not necessarily a bad thing -- but they are unconcerned with with what is happening on the interior. In Matthew 23 Jesus calls the Pharisees "white-washed tombs": having everything put together on the outside but rotten and rotting inside. In this homily we talk about how to avoid the white-washed tomb syndrome in our faith.