Sunday 10 November 2024
32nd Sunday in Ordinary Time
1 Kings 17:10-16. Praise the Lord, my soul! – Psalm 145(146):7-10. Hebrews 9:24-28. Mark 12:38-44.
A divine sacrifice provides redemption for sins
The Hebrews passage probably seems strange to many people nowadays but would have made perfect sense to the Hebrew people who gave their name to the title of the book. Everyone then knew that human sin was a continuous atrocity; they accepted that humans harm each other in their daily actions, their big schemes and their little ones. In recognition of this reality of the human condition, and to remind people constantly of sin’s horrors, annual sacrifice was an essential part of life. But as the Hebrews writer declares, ‘Christ sacrificed himself once to take away the sins of many’. A divine sacrifice, being sinless – like a lamb without blemish – can provide redemption for an infinity of sins. Some may question why all this sacrificial business is necessary; it is God’s way of communicating in no uncertain terms that there really is evil, but there is also genuine good.
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