so in the readings though it says the old covenant is obsolete, it says “In speaking of a new covenant he treats the first as obsolete. And what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.” What does that mean?
It means that the OC was insufficient to justify and save man, although it was a stepping stone along the way as it served to demonstrate that it, the OC, could
not be fulfilled, man could *not *become righteous, by mere external observation of the law even if he were to fulfill it perfectly. The New Covenant is about a
change of heart in man, made possible first of all by reconciliation between man and God, accomplished by Jesus’s sacrificial passion and death, and appropriated by us as we accept His offer, by faith, of forgiveness and enter into relationship or communion with Him, formally at baptism, becoming ‘new creations’, His children, as was always meant to be the case for man. Man doesn’t become righteous by obedience to the Law, rather man becomes righteous by communion with God, ‘apart from Whom he can do nothing’ (John 15:5). This fulfills the New Covenant prophecy of Jer 31:33-34:
“This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel
after that time,” declares the Lord.
“I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
No longer will they teach their neighbor,
or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,”
declares the Lord.
“For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more.”
More can be read from the catechism on this here:
scborromeo.org/ccc/p3s1c3a1.htm#II
