New wine, new skins

Paul describes his unique experience in the second reading (2 Cor 3:1-6). He regards himself as a minister "of a new covenant, not of letter but of spirit; for the letter brings death, but the Spirit gives life."

Raised and educated in a religion of novenas, indulgences and rituals, I once lacked the experience to understand Paul's words. I knew my religious practices differed from the Jewish practices which Paul and Jesus encountered. But I believed Jesus simply had founded a "new religion." He had replaced a bad set of religious practices with a good set.

Going deeper

Mark conveys the problem Jesus encounters whenever He tries to share His faith with others (Mk 2:18-22). He narrates two mini-parables, both triggered when Jesus' disciples sidestep the Jewish religious practice of fasting.

"No one," Jesus reminds His audience, "sews a piece of unshrunken cloth on an old cloak....Likewise, no one pours new wine into old wineskins." In each case, the old can't handle the new; both elements will be lost.

Jesus' adversaries can't grasp His faith because they're trying to squeeze His new teaching into old mindsets. Jesus isn't trying to add a new layer of information to the old information His listeners already have. Rather, He's calling people to revamp the receptacle which receives all information, to change the way they look at reality.

Jesus doesn't conceive of His ministry as exchanging one law for another, or substituting one practice for another, but of transforming the way one relates to God.

Jesus finds support in the faith experiences of Hosea (Hos 2:16-17, 21-22). This eighth-century BCE prophet challenges an all-pervasive religious enemy: fertility cults. The devotees of these cults are known for employing bizarre religious practices: sewing garments out of different kinds of material, boiling baby goats to death in their mothers' milk, plowing fields with an ox and donkey yoked together. But it's important to know that they perform such rituals as a way to control their gods. They believe these actions force the gods to give them the fertility they want.

Who's in charge?

Through the experience of his own disastrous marriage to Gomer, Hosea learns that true faith revolves not around controlling God, but around struggling with and relating to God. A religion built on biblical faith tries to give its people an experience of an unlimited God who is part of their everyday lives. It never attempts to pass on tools and devices for restricting God to the limits of their own desires.

"I will espouse you to me forever," Yahweh promises; "I will espouse you in right and justice, in love and in mercy; I will espouse you in fidelity, and you shall know Yahweh." Faith is all about setting up a relationship with God, not about controlling God.

The experience of knowing God cuts through all religious practices. That's why Jesus and Paul find it difficult to convey such an experience. It's the kind of experience I refuse to acknowledge whenever I return to the secure, controlling religion I learned as a child.

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