The eye is the lamp of the body
Friends in the Lord, many actions that we do are moral acts; some are not moral acts, such as blinking our eyes, the beating of our heart, blood clotting – but many actions we do are moral acts, that is, there is a right or wrong in them, or a ‘best or better.’
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Deciding to sit down to watch tv is a moral act. Visiting a friend, getting up at a certain time are moral acts. The morality, or the rightness of an action depend not only on the action itself and the circumstances, but also on our intention. If we sit down to watch a perfectly good tv show, but we are doing it with the intention of avoiding helping our mother who isn’t feeling well – our bad intention turns this into a sinful action.
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If we give money to a poor man on the street, that would be a good thing – unless our intention was bad, such as doing it so that our friend will be impressed with our generosity. It is easy for our intentions to not be pure in so many events of our daily life. Our motives are often mixed.
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We do or say things for our selfish advantage or to subtly undermine another, or so that we look good. Today, our Lord says, ‘The lamp of the body is the eye. If your eye is sound, your whole body will be filled with light; but if your eye is bad, your whole body will be in darkness.’
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The ‘eye’ is the intention that we have when we do something, and the ‘body’ is the action that follows our intention. In the same way that the body follows the eyes, our works follow our intentions. Our Lord says that it is the intention which gives light to our works. And so without a good intention, there cannot be any good work. Our intention has to be pure and right, in order to do a good work, otherwise, the whole work is darkness, that is, sinful.
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The most pure and right intention we can have is to do everything for love of God. St. Josemaria says, you’ll always have purity of intention if you seek in all things to please only God. (Way, 287)
