Beloved Father, how can we come to understand Your love even more deeply?
When the Israelites offended You by dancing around the golden calf (Ex 32:8), You accepted the plea of Your servant Moses on their behalf and did not hold their sin against them. Time and again we encounter Your willingness to forgive, even when it comes to the most repugnant sins—and there are so many.
Returning to the biblical texts that accompany us during Lent, we hear in today’s reading (Ex 32:7–14) how the Israelites fall into idolatry. Moses must listen to these words addressed to him by the Lord:
“And the Lord said to Moses, ‘Go down; for your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves; they have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them; they have made for themselves a molten calf, and have worshiped it and sacrificed to it, and said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’ And the Lord said to Moses, ‘I have seen this people, and behold, it is a stiff-necked people; now therefore let me alone, that my wrath may burn hot against them and I may consume them; but of you I will make a great nation.’” (vv. 7–10).
Throughout their history, the Israelites were tempted again and again to worship false gods. That was one of the reasons why God wanted to keep them isolated from other peoples, so that they would not imitate their idolatrous practices, which are an abomination in God’s eyes. Sacred Scripture makes it clear that these “false gods” seek to usurp God’s place, and St. Paul teaches that demons hide behind idols to deceive people (cf. 1 Cor 10:19–20). To this day, they continue to work in various ways to turn people away from the knowledge of Christ.
