Christ and Sinners

Thursday of the Thirty-first Week in Ordinary Time C-2

Entrance Antiphon Cf. Ps 38 (37):22-23 Forsake me not, O Lord, my God; be not far from me! Make haste and come to my help, O Lord, my strong salvation!

Collect Almighty and merciful God, by whose gift your faithful offer you right and praiseworthy service, grant, we pray, that we may hasten without stumbling to receive the things you have promised. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

Scripture today: Philippians 3:3-8; Psalm 104; Luke 15:1-10

Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering round to hear Jesus. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, This man welcomes sinners, and eats with them. Then Jesus told them this parable: Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbours together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.' I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent. Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Does she not light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbours together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.' In the same way, I tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. (Luke 15:1-10)

Christ and Sinners Years ago I knew a shearer — one whose occupation was to shear sheep — who would leave his town on the Monday and return on the Friday or Saturday after spending the week on some sheep property. He never missed his Sunday Mass, and one Monday when he was travelling to his workplace for the week, he happened to be with a companion-shearer. His friend half-mockingly said that he heard that he went to church on Sundays — implying that he must think himself “good” for doing this. His Mass-going friend replied, “Look, Bill, I don’t go to Mass because I think I’m good. I go because I know I need to.” In other words it was precisely because he knew he was a sinner that he went to Mass every Sunday without fail. One often hears criticism of the all-too ordinary spiritual calibre of so many church-going Catholics. In their ordinary lives they are hardly impressive. Their sins are very obvious. At the time when the Anglican Newman was feeling the intellectual pressure coming from the Catholic Church, he had recourse to the perceived lack of sanctity in the ranks of ordinary Catholics. Where are your saints? Where is your sanctity? he asked rhetorically — and it is a valid and good question. The Church’s vocation is sanctity, and its business is to produce saints and those who are on the way to sanctity. In fact, as all know, there have been numerous saints in the life of the Church, and the celebration of their sanctity has been itself a point of criticism of the Catholic Church by onlookers and critics. However, it would be a distortion of the plan of God to object to there being many sinners within the pale of the Church, for God has revealed himself in Christ to be welcoming of sinners. In fact, all members of the Church are sinners to a greater or lesser extent, and the saint is the one who, recognizing himself to be a sinner, by the grace of God renounces his sins and pursues the path of ongoing combat with all sin. In a sense, the Church is precisely the place where we would expect to see sinners gathered together. Why is this so? This is so because the Church is where Jesus Christ her Head is to be found, and Christ attracts sinners.

In our Gospel today (Luke 15:1-10) we see a strange paradox so typical of Gospel scenes. One would expect that if the Son of God were to become man, all-holy as he was, it would be those recognized as religious who would be flocking to see and hear him. The ones recognized by the nation to be religious were the scribes, the Pharisees, the priests. But the ones most hostile to him were drawn precisely from that class. The ones, on the contrary, who were flocking to see him were the ordinary folk, and in particular the sinners. It turns out, then, that God is such as to attract sinners to him, once he reveals himself for who he really is — provided the sinners in question genuinely desire something better than what they have and are. In our Gospel today “the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering round to hear Jesus.” They were “all” gathering around Jesus to hear him. They were very close to him, pressing on him. They felt entirely welcome. It seemed to them that Jesus very much liked having them near him, and each felt individually welcomed. This was so noteworthy a characteristic of the impression Jesus unfailingly gave that on one occasion when Jesus was dining in the home of a leading Pharisee — one regarded as a very “religious” person — a notorious sinner boldly entered the house to be with Jesus. She stood before him in tears, and washed his very feet. Sinners who wished to do better had no doubt of the reception he would always give them. Here was a great prophet who loved sinners, and all the sinners knew it — all those, that is, who knew that they themselves were sinners. Christ looked with delight on their recognition of their spiritual condition and on their floundering efforts to be and do better. He spoke publicly with commendation and admiration of the prayer of the repentant sinner — such as in his story of the Publican praying in the Temple. One of the most surprising things that the true and only God has revealed of himself in Christ his Son is his loving compassion for sinners. Typically, Christ was surrounded by sinners who were seeking to hear him. He required, though, that they hear his word, repent, and put it into practice.

Rudolf Otto famously described the religious experience as being of a reality that is tremendum et fascinans. True, of course — and the terrible, awesome, winning, captivating nature of the divine is ever the substratum of religion. But the one only God has revealed a host of surprises in revealing himself. He is a trinity of Persons, and he is boundless love. His power shows itself in compassion and mercy. In particular, sinners who recognize their sin crowd forward to be with him and to hear what he is saying. They typically want to be with him. Not so the sinner who does not recognize his sin. Let us make the basis of our lives the Fact of a loving God who has come to redeem us and take us out of our sin to everlasting sanctity.

(E.J.Tyler)

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A Second Reflection: (Luke 15:1-10)

Recognition of Sin Let us notice in Luke 15: 1-10 who were the ones who were "all seeking the company of Jesus to hear what he had to say". They were the sinners and the publicans. It is the Pharisees themselves who in this text tell us that our Lord "welcomes sinners and eats with them." They complained that our Lord delighted that sinners (i.e., those who knew they were sinners) were in his company. He welcomed as one would friends, and dined with them. The sinners could see that our Lord's great holiness was manifest and genuine, and at the same time he, all-holy as he was, loved them and was truly happy to have them with him. They knew they were sinners, and at the same time they knew that they were loved and would be helped to be better than what they were. That indicates to us what our Lord expects us to recognize in our turn. He wishes us to acknowledge our moral failures in respect to God and others, and at the same time our Lord's great love and compassion for us.

Therefore in our prayer with the aid of this text, let us place ourselves in the company of the publicans and the sinners. Let us resolve to use all the means our Lord gives us to grow in humility and in faith in his love.

(E.J.Tyler)

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