How we got into this mess

The world is in a mess right now and many people are pointing fingers.

So it was in the beginning, as we hear in today’s first reading (Genesis 3:9-24), as Adam blames Eve and Eve blames the serpent.

All of them, of course, are responsible.

And bad things happen afterwards: consequences of the bad choices – the sins – that were committed.

It was at the moment of the first sin that the perfect harmony of the created world was destroyed.

It was at that moment that humanity entered the world in which we live now: a world of pain, hard work, and death.

Yet even then, God hints at a way out, through the offspring of the woman who would crush the head of the serpent: our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ who conquers sin and death and, as we hear in today’s Gospel (Mark 8:1-10), whose "heart is moved with pity".

Have pity on us, dearest Lord Jesus.
Save us from what we have done to ourselves
and set us free from sin and death.