THE DISTANCE OF ONE’S LIPS 

TO ONE’S HEART

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 5^th Tuesday in Ordinary Time is, “The Distance of One’s Lips to One’s Heart.”

[Gesture - with hands - from lips to heart and then say] “That’s about 12 inches or one foot to one’s mouth - to one’s heart.”

TODAY’S READINGS

Today’s First Reading - Genesis 1: 4 to 2:4a -  has these wonderful words from the first Creation Account in Genesis, Yesterday we heard about God’s creations on the first 4 days. Today we have the last 3 days - the last day being the Sabbath - the day of rest. It looks like the idea of weeks of 7 days - with one day of rest - goes way, way back, into our history.

Today’s Gospel - Mark 7;1-13 -  has these powerful words of Jesus - the heart of what I want to talk about. It’s something Jesus discovered: some people honor God with their lips but their hearts are far away.

Let me try to tie the two readings together this way:  the first creation account has God speaking and his words create the world - the universe. His words are powerful - creative. When God says, “Let there be birds and fish and creepy crawly things”, there are birds and fish and creepy crawly things as a result.

Our words can be empty and vain - fake and disconnected to our heart.  Question: how creative are my words?  Do my words bring light and life - like God’s words? After all I’m made in the image and likeness of God.

The title of my homily is, “The Distance of One’s Lips to One’s Heart.”

Last night while working on this homily I couldn’t find a specific quote I was looking for. I remember reading in Rabbinic Literature that rabbis liked to point out that the distance from the lips to the heart or vice versa - can be very close or very far.

The distance from the lips to the heart can be seven miles for some - and right next to each other for others.

Jesus met people giving lip service to God, to the Law, but that’s all it is: lip service.

Their bodies - their words - their prayers were in the temple - but their hearts were miles away.

THE PAUSE THAT REFRESHES

Today’s first reading from Genesis ends with mention of the Sabbath.

These Genesis stories are here to teach us great lessons. The story teller is saying - we need to take a break every seven days - like God did. Then on the Sabbath - we need to stop. We need to rest. We need distance and difference from the rest of the week.

We as Christians have Sabbath.

We also have Lent. It starts tomorrow.

The books in the back of Church - the readings at Mass - have plenty of food for thought - to digest.

CONCLUSION

This morning my message would be to rest - be silent - reflective - and check out the distance between  my words and my heart.

If you use Map Quest or one of these GPS programs to get directions, they often tell us how many miles we are from our destination.

In this homily I’m saying we can be praying with our lips but our hearts can be far from God. We do this to each other as well. We can say to another, “I love you” but it can be lip service. The words never get down to our heart or come from the heart. The result can be babble not Bible.

This Lent close the distance. This could be a good Lenten resolution.