It does not pat us on the back.
It searches us.

Our Lord says: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.”

That sentence corrects two common mistakes.

The first is to think the commandments no longer matter.
The second is to think that keeping them outwardly is enough.

Christ rejects both.

Jesus does not lower the bar.
He raises it — and then He moves it inside us.

We often ask, “What is allowed?”
Jesus asks, “What is happening in your heart?”

“You have heard that it was said…
‘You shall not murder.’”

But then He says: “Everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment.”

Again: “You shall not commit adultery.”

But He says: “Everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

This is the truth.

Sin does not begin in the hands.
It begins in the heart.

We do not wake up one morning and commit grave sin.
We rehearse it.
We justify it.
We cradle it.

The act is only the fruit.
The root is interior.

And this is where Sirach helps us.

“If you will, you can keep the commandments…
He has placed before you fire and water; stretch out your hand for whichever you choose.”

We are not puppets.
We are not victims of instinct.
We are not prisoners of temperament.

We are not programmed by the culture.

God has made us capable of choosing the good.

And here is the first uncomfortable truth:
we are responsible.

That truth offends modern ears.
But without responsibility, there is no dignity.

It is fashionable to blame circumstances, upbringing, stress, personality.
But the Word of God says: choose.

God has made us free.

Not free to invent good and evil.
But free to choose between them.

Freedom is not the ability to do whatever we please, to follow every impulse.

That is not freedom — that is slavery with good marketing.

Freedom is the ability to choose what is truly good.

A person ruled by their passions is not free.

They are controlled by what they have not mastered. 

They are governed by what they refuse to govern.

So when Christ speaks about anger, lust, and speech, He is not tightening the screws. He is revealing where real freedom lies.

A person who nurses anger is not free.
A person who indulges lust is not free.
A person who bends the truth for convenience is not free.

Notice what Jesus does not say.

He does not say, “Keep your anger polite.”
He says: deal with it.

He does not say, “Avoid being caught.”
He says: purify your intent.

He does not say, “Make your lies believable.”
He says: “Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from evil.”

There it is.

No manipulation.
No hedging.
No spiritual double-entry bookkeeping.

Because the real issue is integrity.

We keep anger within “acceptable limits.”
We entertain desires so long as no one sees.
We justify small manipulations of truth.

And then we say, “I have not broken the commandment.”

Christ says: look again.

The Law fulfilled is the Law interiorised.

We become what we love.

If we love resentment, we become bitter.
If we love pleasure above truth, we become unstable.
If we love God above all, we become ordered.

Left to ourselves, we excuse anger.
We justify desire.
We rationalise speech.

The Spirit does something deeper.
He reorders love.

That is the key.

Every sin is, at root, a disorder of love.

We love something created more than we love God.

We love pleasure more than purity.

We love self-protection more than truth.

Christ fulfils the law by restoring right order.

To love God above all things —
and everything else in Him.

This is why the Church refuses to soften Christ’s words.

Not because she is severe.
But because she knows what heals.

A doctor who names a disease is not cruel. They are honest.

Christ names the disease of the heart.

But He also provides the cure.

He does not say: “Purify yourself and then come to Me.”

He says: “Come to Me — and I will make you new.”

The Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time forces us to ask:

Do I settle for external decency?
Or do I seek interior conversion?

Do I avoid scandal, yet harbour resentment?
Do I appear faithful, yet feed interior fantasies?
Do I speak kindly, yet manipulate quietly?

Our Lord will not allow that division.

He desires not minimal obedience —
but holiness.

Sirach says: “Before a man are life and death, and whichever he chooses will be given to him.”

Christ now shows us where that choice is truly made.

In the heart.

Every day.

In thoughts unseen.
In desires unspoken.
In words lightly spoken.

And this is not meant to discourage us.

It is meant to elevate us.

You were not created for mediocrity.

You were created for communion with God.

And communion requires likeness.

God is truth.
Therefore your speech must be true.

God is faithful.
Therefore your desires must be faithful.

God is love.
Therefore your heart must be ordered to love.

This is not achieved overnight.

It is the work of grace —
and cooperation.

God acts.
We respond.

That is the Christian life.

Christ does not expose the heart to shame us.
He exposes it to heal us.

A surgeon must cut before they can restore.

The Gospel today is surgical.

It is sharp. Precise. Necessary.
But it is merciful.

Because God wants more for us than minimal compliance.

Minimal religion produces minimal saints.

We were not baptised to be barely decent.

We were baptised to be transformed.

So today, do not leave this church thinking:
“This is too high.”

Leave thinking:
“This is what I am made for.”

Ask not merely for forgiveness.
Ask for a new heart.

Ask that anger be healed.
Ask that desire be purified.
Ask that speech be made clean.

Because Christ has not come
to lower the law.

He has come
to write it upon your heart.