THE WORD OF GOD – AUGUST 28, 2024 REFLECTION
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites. You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and every kind of filth. On the outside you appear righteous, but inside you are filled with hypocrisy and evildoing.” (Matthew 23:27-28)
The word “hypocrisy” originates from the Greek word “hypokrisis,” which was used to describe any type of public performance.
The word “hypocrite” was derived from Greek “hypokrite,” which expressly referred to an actor on the open-air stage. Actors would wear oversized masks made of stiffened linen or wood so that their exaggerated features could be viewed from afar by a large audience of at least several thousand.
To be a hypocrite is to wear a mask, according to this meaning. Hypocrisy is all about inconsistency and fakery—serving up a false face to others, putting on a mask that hides the person behind it.
The opposite of hypocrisy is integrity, that is, consistency of interior convictions and external conduct. A person with integrity holds fast to righteous values and principles and witnesses to them with words and actions. They demonstrate honesty, decency, virtue, probity, and honor.
God has gifted the Church with outstanding personages—the saints—who witness to integrity.
When Saint Bruno of Cologne declined his appointment by the clergy of Rheims as their bishop, his intention was to repudiate the despotism that he had endured under the corrupt bishop Manasses de Gournai and follow through on his resolve to pursue holiness in the eremitical life.
When Saint Joan of Arc answered her opponents truthfully during her trial for heresy, she was steadfastly following the dictates of her conscience, so that her enemies had to resort to trickery in order to convict her of a capital crime. She was burned at the stake for her constancy.
When Saint Giuseppe Moscati passed away at the relatively young age of 46, he was remembered as a pious and accomplished medical doctor who treated the sick, comforted the suffering, and practiced liberality toward the poor. Calling attention to the unity of his life both interior and exterior, God worked miracles through his intercession.
The gospels record how Jesus complimented those he dealt with for their signal virtue, and some of them are even named—Saint John the Baptist for his holiness, Saint Peter for his faith, Saint Mary, Saint Martha’s sister, for her spirit of listening prayer.
Unforgettably, the Lord bestowed a compliment for the ages upon the apostle Nathanael for his integrity: “Here is a true Israelite. There is no duplicity in him.” (John 1:47)
Do we, too, stand before the Lord without duplicity? Do we live with integrity? Or are we hypocrites in one or more aspects of our lives?
May the Lord give us the grace to live with integrity, to become the saints we are called to be!
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