But the days will come when the bridegroom
is taken away from them, and then they will fast on that day. No one sews a
piece of unshrunken cloth on an old cloak. If he does, its fullness pulls away,
the new from the old, and the tear gets worse. Likewise, no one pours new wine
into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine
and the skins are ruined. Rather, new wine is poured into fresh
wineskins.”
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Reflection:
A renewed catholic had said that his life was never the same since he had a personal relationship with Jesus. He said that since he met Jesus he was always joyful. And even if there were problems he always ensures that it would never ruin his day. His reason for his newfound joyfulness and happiness is his reenergized faith in Jesus.
Fasting in the context of our gospel reading for today is connected with self-sacrifice or self-denial. Which is actually not bad because it strengthens a person’s faith and dependence on God. But there is something that is very much supreme than fasting and it’s no other than Jesus! If Jesus is in our life we have to rejoice.
For the reason that Jesus will teach us to fast without anyone else knowing it and this is the more important form of fasting: fasting that is not for show and fasting that is not seen and known by anyone except Jesus.
The disciples of John and the Pharisees in our gospel were after the exterior fasting. Fasting that can be seen by the naked eyes and Jesus surely hates this kind of superficiality. If we are already with Jesus we would not be concerned anymore about superficial fasting. For the simple reason that we will fast without broadcasting it for the world to hear and see.
Nobody will know about this kind of
fasting except you and Jesus. And this would surely happen the moment you learn
how to surrender your life to the Lord. – Marino J. Dasmarinas