Tag Archives: holy places

How Lovely is Your Dwelling Place, O Lord: 1 Kings 8

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Years ago I stood with pilgrims looking towards Jerusalem where the Jewish temple once stood. Today’s reading from the Book of Kings focuses on the temple King Solomon built.

David before him wanted to build a temple, but the Prophet Nathan told him God doesn’t need a fixed place to dwell in. ( 2 Samuel 7, 4-17) God dwells in a tent, ready to go wherever his people go. A beautiful reminder– God is with us at all times, wherever we are.

Yet, God dwells in certain holy places, like the temple Solomon built on the threshing floor in the upper city in Jerusalem, A dark cloud filled the Holy of Holies, so awesome the priests can’t remain in the place. “… The priests could no longer minister because of the cloud, since the LORD’s glory had filled the temple of the LORD.” (1 Kings 8,22-30)

“Can it indeed be that God dwells on earth? If the heavens and the highest heavens cannot contain you, how much less this temple which I have built!” Solomon seeks God’s blessing for his people and himself there. “Listen to the petitions of your servant and of your people Israel which they offer in this place. Listen from your heavenly dwelling and grant pardon.”

A good reading to reflect on the presence of God in our lives. God promises to be with us in a presence always mysterious, beyond our understanding. He goes with us wherever we go. There are also holy places where God meets us– sacraments, signs, places he’s promised to be.

Jesus, the new temple of God, fulfills these Old Testament realities. He dwells among us, accompanying us on our journey of life in signs and sacraments. He will always be there. Yet his presence is also “a dark cloud,” the mystery of his death and resurrection. Awesome, mysterious, beyond our understanding.

Whenever we draw close and pray, he is there. Always there.

The Maccabees: Restoring the Temple

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This week’s Mass readings from the 1st Book of Maccabees tell the story of the re-dedication of the temple of Jerusalem three years after its profanation  by Antiochus Epiphanes.  About the year 167 BC,  Jews under Judas Maccabeus took up the weapons of their time, re-conquered Jerusalem and restored the temple, the heart of their religion.

The first reading on Friday describes the rededication of the temple to its former glory. The Jews continue to celebrate it in the feast of Hannukah. (1 Maccabees 4,36-61}

The New Testament writers, certainly aware of this historic event, recall Jesus cleansing the temple.(Friday’s gospel) Entering Jerusalem after his journey from Galilee, “ Jesus went into the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, saying to them, ‘It is written, My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.’” Then, “every day he was teaching in the temple area” until he was arrested and put to death. (Luke 19,45-48)

Cleansing the temple was a symbolic act. By it,  Jesus signified  he is the presence of God, the Word made flesh, the new temple of God.

Luke says Jesus taught in the temple “every day.” Even from his early days he taught in the temple, Luke writes. As our eternal high priest, he teaches us every day and brings us every day to his Father and our Father.

Jesus is the indestructible temple, the indestructible Presence of God among us. Witnesses at his trial before he died were half right when they said he spoke of destroying the temple. He was speaking of the temple of his own body. Death seemed to destroy him, but he was raised up bodily on the third day.We share in this mystery as “members of his body.”

Still, as sacramental people we need places like temples and churches to come together, to pray and to meet God who “dwells among us.” We need churches and holy places and instinctively revolt seeing them go, or not frequented.

Old stories, like the story of the Maccabees, carry lessons and raise questions. The Maccabees took the military option to restore and pursue the Kingdom. What are our military options today when we have atomic weapons, drones, cryptoweaponry at our disposal? New laws? Persuasion?

Old stories raise questions.