False oath - Perjury

Jesus talks about oaths, fasting and prayer. In his sermon, he dwells on man's difficulty in being honest and on his false oaths: all too often, man is a perjurer, and he who demands an oath does not himself have much confidence in his neighbor. When we take an oath and swear to something, invoking that which is dearest to us, we deceive our neighbor: we are thieves, sacrilegious, traitors and homicidal. But we don't deceive God, who is Truth itself. Jesus therefore encourages people not to take false oaths, as in the Gospel, and he enjoins others not to swear on the dead, nor on the head of our family, nor on our body, which belongs to God. Let our yes be a yes and a no be a no.

Secondly, Christ insists on prayer said from the heart, where we seek not to be noticed and are not overcome by scruples. We must stop counting the number of hours we spend in prayer: it's not so much soulless prayers that count, but actions and words said with love. Jesus declares that we can do anything by praying: whether it's making a loaf of bread or doing our work, as long as we seek to love in everything. We must also not be afraid to ask, for God is a Father who watches over us and our needs.

Then the Master explains why God may not answer our prayer. He may refuse us a grace because it would hurt us in the future. Sometimes, therefore, God says: "I cannot", because in His Wisdom, He sees that such a grace, which seems good to us now, would be harmful to us later.

Finally, Jesus applies what he says about prayer to fasting: we mustn't flaunt it in public or be sad, but be joyful and act as if we've eaten well. Hiding this fast from others will be an act of heroism, and God will reward us for not seeking praise from men. What's more, anyone who fasts out of love feeds on love.

The Savior then sends away the people who are listening and welcomes two poor people. One is Ishmael, a man rejected by his daughter who wants to make his last Easter; the other is a woman named Sarath who is ill. He heals the latter and Jesus asks him to look after the old man. Christ then asks Simon the Zealot if he can entrust them to Lazarus, since they are two poor men who have nothing, and Lazarus assures him that he can. The episode ends with the old man happily adopting a new daughter and finding a new protector.