Patrick Comerford
Since the 50-day season of Easter came to an end with the Day of Pentecost or Whit Sunday (24 May 2026), we have returned to Ordinary Time once again. This week began with Trinity Sunday (31 May 2026), and tomorrow is the Feast of Corpus Christi (4 June 2026). But the liturgical colour today remains the Green of Ordinary Time, and today the calendar of the Church of England in Common Worship recalls the Martyrs of Uganda (1885-1887, 1977).
Later today (3 June 2026), I hope to take part in the choir rehearsals in Saint Mary and Saint Giles Church, Stony Stratford. But, before today begins, I am taking some quiet time this morning to give thanks, to reflect, to pray and to read in these ways:
1, reading today’s Gospel reading;
2, a short reflection;
3, a prayer from the USPG prayer diary;
4, the Collects and Post-Communion prayer of the day.
Mark 12: 18-27 (NRSVA):
18 Some Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection, came to him and asked him a question, saying, 19 ‘Teacher, Moses wrote for us that if a man’s brother dies, leaving a wife but no child, the man shall marry the widow and raise up children for his brother. 20 There were seven brothers; the first married and, when he died, left no children; 21 and the second married her and died, leaving no children; and the third likewise; 22 none of the seven left children. Last of all the woman herself died. 23 In the resurrection whose wife will she be? For the seven had married her.’
24 Jesus said to them, ‘Is not this the reason you are wrong, that you know neither the scriptures nor the power of God? 25 For when they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven. 26 And as for the dead being raised, have you not read in the book of Moses, in the story about the bush, how God said to him, “I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob”? 27 He is God not of the dead, but of the living; you are quite wrong.’
Today’s reflections:
The Gospel reading at the Eucharist in the lectionary today (Mark 12: 18-27) offers an opportunity to reflect both on how we treat the marginalised today and how we how we imagine heavenly life.
This account is set in the Temple in Jerusalem in Holy Week, on the day after Christ has overturned the tables of the moneychangers. There, as were read yesterday (Mark 12: 13-17), Christ is challenged by both the Pharisees and the Herodians, the people who supported Herod, the Roman puppet king, when they put to him was one of great questions at the time: should religious and pious Jews pay taxes to Rome?
Next, along come the Sadducees, who said there is no resurrection, but come with contorted questions about the afterlife.
When I read this passage, I also think of an old Hollywood musical, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954), starring Jane Powell and Howard Keel, of the many superstitions about the seventh son of a seventh son, and even about a restaurant I know in the old Venetian harbour in Rethymnon in Crete called ‘The Seven Brothers’ (Τα Επτά Αδέρφια).
But this reading about seven brothers and one bride is primarily a story about questions about the resurrection (for parallel readings see also Matthew 22: 23-33; Luke 20: 27-40).
After his arrival in Jerusalem, Christ is in the Temple each day, teaching kingdom values. But his teaching is ignored by those who see him as a threat to their power and their privilege, by those who want to get rid of him at any cost … without realising that their choice, their actions, are part of the climax that ushers in Christ’s reign.
As an example of his kingdom values, his rejection of the either-or options, the black-or-white, the take-it-or-leave-it values of the world, Christ refuses to enter the debate about paying Temple taxes with imperial Roman coins (Mark 12: 13-17).
So another trap is set – this time by the Sadducees, the Temple priests. They held that only the first five books of the Bible, the Torah or the Pentateuch, were authoritative. They had very traditional views of the Law and rejected what they saw as the novel idea of life after death. They saw it as a dangerous innovation, an importation from the Babylonian exile, a Persian idea adapted by the Pharisees. The more traditional view accepted that people were rewarded or punished by God in this life.
So, seeking to trap Jesus into speaking against the Law, they pose this puzzle about a woman who ends up marrying seven brothers, each of whom dies in turn. In the new life, whose wife will she be?
The apostles later have a similar encounter with the Sadducees when they are preaching the Resurrection (see also Acts 4: 1-4), as does the Apostle Paul when he faces the council (Acts 23: 6-10).
This question about ‘levirate’ marriage is not about the marriage of Levites, but comes from the Latin word levir, meaning a brother-in-law. There was a sense in which a man was seen to live on in his son. So, if a man died without sons and heirs, his brother was required to marry his widow and give her a son, thus continuing the family line (see Deuteronomy 25: 5-10; see also Genesis 38: 8).
Saint Mark makes the same point that human relations in the home do not exist in the same way beyond death. Christ distinguishes two ages and kinds of existence. Mortals are part of this age by the very fact of our physical birth, and of the age to come by resurrection (see also Romans 1: 4).
Christ argues for life after death, and for the resurrection, from the Pentateuch, the very five books to which the Sadducees limited their understanding of what is Scripture. In the story of the Burning Bush, God tells Moses: ‘I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob’ (verse 26; see Exodus 3: 6). Because God says he is (not was), Abraham is alive now. He died, so he must have been brought back to life, resurrected. God is truly ‘God … of the living’ (verse 27). God is not frustrated by physical death.
What happens afterwards?
According to Saint Luke’s version, some scribes, who are believers in resurrection, are pleased with Jesus’ argument. The Sadducees ‘no longer dared to ask him [Christ] another question’. Christ has evaded the trap that was set for him. What does this say about how we should deal with those who question and challenge the Christian faith?
This reading also poses some pastoral questions for the practice of pastoral ministry in parish life. In all the discussion, no-one refers to the right of the woman to her own integrity, her own inherent or intrinsic value, her own right to eternal life with equality in the eyes of God.
The woman who was married off to seven brothers never made herself the victim, never chose her own misfortune. She is an object, a chattel, perhaps merely a trafficked sex slave, in the eyes of the interlocutors. But for Christ, she is to be seen as a child of God.
In those days it was never a woman’s choice to be a widow or, for that matter, to be divorced. At the time, women could often only acquiesce to what their husbands wanted to do.
What response to this reading might we expect from people in a parish who are widowed or divorced, or in difficult or broken marriages, or people who have never married?
Today’s Prayers (Wednesday 3 June 2026):
A new edition of Pray with the World Church, the prayer diary of the Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel), was published last week, in time for the USPG conference in the High Leigh, Hertfordshire, which opened yesterday (2 June) and continues until tomorrow (4 June). The theme this week, from 31 May to 6 June 2026 (pp 6-7), is ‘Peacebuilding in the Gulf’. This theme was introduced on Sunday with a reflection from Saint Christopher’s Cathedral in Bahrain.
The USPG Prayer Diary today (Wednesday 3 June 2026) invites us to pray:
God of hope, sustain Anglican churches across the Gulf, from the UAE to Bahrain, Kuwait, and Qatar and elsewhere, as they navigate daily anxieties and dangers. May the rhythms of prayer, the hope found in Scripture, and fellowship with one another anchor them in your presence.
The Collect of the Day:
Almighty and everlasting God,
you have given us your servants grace,
by the confession of a true faith,
to acknowledge the glory of the eternal Trinity
and in the power of the divine majesty to worship the Unity:
keep us steadfast in this faith,
that we may evermore be defended from all adversities;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Gracious God, lover of all,
in this sacrament
we are one family in Christ your Son,
one in the sharing of his body and blood
and one in the communion of his Spirit:
help us to grow in love for one another
and come to the full maturity of the Body of Christ.
We make our prayer through your Son our Saviour.
Additional Collect:
Holy God,
faithful and unchanging:
enlarge our minds with the knowledge of your truth,
and draw us more deeply into the mystery of your love,
that we may truly worship you,
Father, Son and Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Collect on the Eve of Corpus Christi:
Lord Jesus Christ,
we thank you that in this wonderful sacrament
you have given us the memorial of your passion:
grant us so to reverence the sacred mysteries
of your body and blood
that we may know within ourselves
and show forth in our lives
the fruits of your redemption;
for you are alive and reign with the Father
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Yesterday’s Reflections
Continued Tomorrow
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
No comments:
Post a Comment