Fr Charlie notes that Moses pitches the “meeting tent” outside the camp in today’s first reading. The Israelites had set themselves apart from God in making the golden calf. Only Moses and Joshua, who had not been party to the idolatry, dared enter the tent. God speaks to Moses in the tent to let him know that while he forgives the Israelites their “wickedness and crime and sin” that their poor choices – as do ours – still have consequences.
“The LORD, the LORD, a merciful and gracious God… forgiving wickedness and crime and sin; yet not declaring the guilty guiltless.”
EX 33:7-11; 34:5B-9, 28
“At the end of the age the Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his Kingdom all who cause others to sin and all evildoers.”
MT 13:36-43