Woe to you blind guides.......Matthew 23:13 - 24

It would seem that the "scribes and Pharisees" were in for a tongue lashing extraordinaire in this passage from Matthew's Gospel. Jesus provides example after example of the ways he sees these religious leaders fall short of their call. In a word, the theme of his denunciations is that they are hypocrites in preaching the "RIGHT" while living as if they are above these very same teachings. Without mincing words, Jesus exposes the hypocrisy of these men who time and time again questioned him in order to trap him in a violation of the law. A more modern idiom might be that these men practiced the "do as I say, not as I do" school of religious leadership.

One thought I had as I read this passage was how little things have changed in two thousand years. One has only to read of the Belgian Roman Catholic Primate's statement on AIDS "I do not see this illness as a punishment, at most a sort of inherent justice … Perhaps human love also wreaks revenge if it is mishandled, without there having to be a transcendental source.” or to witness the hateful antics of the Westboro Baptist Church and it's pastor Fred Phelps. These "religious leaders" seem to have fallen into the same trap as the scribes and Pharisees in neglecting "...the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith"(v.23).

Human denunciation of these hateful statements and actions don't touch such people who are absolutely convinced they are "RIGHT". Such people remain unmoved by Jesus' call to be "TRUE" to the weightier matters of justice, mercy and faith. They insist they are doing just that in spreading their nearly universally condemned teachings and repugnant actions. In such people, the scribes and Pharisees walk among us.

I have great hope in seeing people who remain TRUE to the gospel values of justice, mercy and faith despite the words and actions of so called "religious leaders". While present day scribes and Pharisees seem to get all the press, I believe history and the evolution of human society will go the way of those who seek to remain TRUE.