In today's Gospel (Lk 19: 45-48) we see the split which so often appears in the Gospel narratives-- the people who follow Jesus versus the Jewish leaders. The leaders have determined that they will figure out a way to put Jesus to death, but they can't figure out how to do so because "all the people were hanging on His words." Why the split, the division, the disconnect between the leaders and the people? Jesus gives the answer numerous times in the Scriptures when He calls the scribes and Pharisees and other leaders "hypocrites." You see it in the story of the Good Samaritan, where the Jewish leaders (a priest and a Levite) pass by the injured man on the side of the road, while a Samaritan tends the man's wounds and arranges for his care. Jesus calls the Pharisees "whitewashed tombs" because they look good on the outside but are quite different on the inside. The word "hypocrite" comes out of Jesus' mouth time and again to describe those in leadership, those who create difficult burdens for the people but carry none of those burdens themselves. There is nothing that turns people off more quickly and more profoundly than hypocrisy. When someone says one thing and does another, people stop listening to what the person says. And, when the person is judgmental and categorical in the person's condemnation of the actions of another, while doing the same and worse themselves, people get genuinly angry. You lose all your moral credibility when you are discovered to be a hypocrite. That's what separated the Jewish people from their leaders 2,000 years ago and, sadly, it is that view --that the Church is filled with hypocrites --that separates people from Christianity today. If you ask the "nones" why they have abandoned organnized religion, that idea of hypocrisy comes up again and again. No amount of talking will change things once someone has been found to be a hypocrite, since the very nature of hypocrist is that you "talk the talk," but don't "walk the walk." Only actions matter-- a lengthy, consistent, dramatic series of actions is all that will persuade the people who used to be in the pews that the hypocrisy in the Church has been banished once and for all. In his talk at the USCCB in Baltimore earlier this month, Bishop Robert Barron of LA articulated 5 strategies the Church needs to employ if it is to get the "nones" re-engaged. The first was this: we need to lead with actively involving people, especially the young, idealistic people, in works of justice. We, and by that I mean especially the clergy, need to stop just saying we are followers of Jesus, and start actually being followers of Jesus. That means actually doing the works Jesus told us to do, all those works listed in Jesus' final teaching in Matthew's Gospel at the end of chapter 25, those works which separated the sheep from the goats. We know what they are-- feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, caring for the sick, visiting those in prison, welcoming the stranger, giving drink to the thirsty. Absent doing those things we are just people of talk only, and all the healing Masses and public apologies (important as they are) won't make a bit of difference to the people who have decided we're all hypocrites. What was one of Pope Francis's first public actions after being elected Pope? He washed the feet of people in prison. It is action, not words, that gets rid of what divides us.