Saturday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time

The disciples walk through a field, pick some food, and begin to eat. The Pharisees ask them, “Why are you doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” Luke 6:2. But notice the question no one seems to ask: “Whose field is this?”

That tells us something about how different their priorities were from ours. Imagine the same situation today. A group of what are effectively vagrants are wandering through a field—our field. We probably aren’t going to approach them with a religious question: “Why are you working on a Sunday?” We are more likely to begin debating within ourselves, “Am I allowed to shoot them under stand-your-ground laws?”

That says a lot about us. My point is not so much the violence in that example as the way our priorities have changed. We all have the same tendency to choose one good over another.

In the ancient world, the priority in this encounter is God’s law. They are not as concerned about their property because the Old Testament law allows hungry people to do this: to walk through a field and take a little food. They cannot take the whole field, but they can have a little. Deut 23:26 (NABRE). Even after the harvest, you are not allowed to go back and collect what you missed. What remains must be left for the poor to come and take their share. Lev 19:9–10; Deut 24:19–21.

So they do not ask the property question. They ask the religious question. And Christ points out that they have placed the good of observing the Sabbath and taking that rest above even the good of life itself.

Today, we probably would not think about the Sabbath at all. We would think about the good of our private property. We would place that above life itself, even while recognizing that the people before us are hungry and need food.

So much of life is like that. We have various goods that we are trying to balance. The Sabbath law is a good thing. It serves humanity and helps us develop our relationship with God. Private property is a good thing. It promotes good stewardship of the world and all that God has given us. But these goods are not absolute. They have to be held in their proper order. Life is a greater good than either of those things because it is a precondition for all the others. It should be given priority.

Those who are hungry should be fed, whether their hunger is their fault or not. Someone could say to the apostles and Christ himself, “Well, you should have prepared a meal knowing it would be the Sabbath.” Yet no one says that.

We have to recognize our own fallibility and weakness. Sometimes people will be hungry because of choices they have made; sometimes they will be hungry for other reasons. The only right response in that moment is to feed them, in recognition of the good that is life itself.

In every choice we make, there will be goods to balance. We have to look within ourselves and rely upon the Holy Spirit, who speaks to us and helps us discern: What is the greater good in this moment? What is the higher good? Then we have to choose it.

There will always be some things we have to leave aside. That drives so many debates in our world: people choose different goods and are unwilling to recognize that some things must be given priority.

So whenever we face an especially difficult decision, let us turn to the Holy Spirit. Let us allow him to guide our choices and order the goods in our lives, so that we always choose the greater goods rather than focus on things of lesser importance.