OT XXXI [C] Wis 11:22–12:2; 2 Thes 1:11–2:2. Lk 19:1-10

The basic message of today’s gospel account is that Jesus went into Zacchaeus’ house and Zacchaeus ended up going into God’s house. The message in all three of today’s scripture readings is all about receiving God’s life-changing love, about receiving and accepting the presence, power, and love of God, which is why He has invited us here today into His house.

God knows our weakness. He does not want us to stay lost or to keep hurting ourselves and others by our habitual fears and failings, and so, as the First Reading reminds us: ‘Little by little, you correct those who offend, you admonish and remind them of how they have sinned, so that they may abstain from evil and trust in you, O Lord’.

God’s gentle and pardoning love is revealed in Jesus, and perhaps nowhere more convincingly that in the scene portrayed in today’s Gospel (Luke 19:1-10). Jesus is constantly lamenting the problems that material wealth brings to those whose hearts are distracted by it (see Luke 6:24; 18:24-25). Yet, here we see Zacchaeus who must have been one of the most hated men in Jericho.

Jewish tax collectors were the most hated of them all because they were puppets of the Romans. They could unleash the Roman soldiers upon Jews who didn’t pay the amounts set by those tax collectors. Not only were these tax collectors traitors to the Jewish people; they were traitors to the Jewish religion.

Not only had he acquired wealth from his fellow countrymen by extortion, he had done it in the name of the hated foreign overlords, the Romans. This man is truly ‘lost’.

However, he is keen to see Jesus and is willing to go to any lengths to do so. Jesus responds to his wishes and sees in this distracted man’s heart a generosity hidden from the man himself and from all who knew him. Jesus invites himself to enjoy Zacchaeus’ hospitality and the childlike delight with which the tax collector responds is proof of an innocence that underlay his foolish preoccupation with wealth. He receives Jesus with joy. He now has something to live for and so finds the energy and determination to bring about changes to his way of life.

Notice Jesus’ words: ‘Today, salvation has come to this house!’ The Church wants each of us to hear these same words. There is a grace here in today’s liturgy for each and all of us. We are fragile; we make mistakes; we are more frightened than we dare admit; we are often lost and bewildered. Today, this same Jesus is inviting us to look into our hearts and discover there our longing for love. He is inviting us to look out at creation and ponder the beauty that we see there: fragile creatures held in a wonderful harmony, which transcends even the destructive forces of human folly.

Zacchaeus, we are told, ‘was trying to see Jesus. As the scene draws to a close it becomes clear that the longing in the heart of Zacchaeus was in response to an even deeper longing in the heart of Jesus who ‘came to seek out and to save the lost’. Today he wants to touch that part of each of us that is lost. He wants to share this meal with us and lift our hearts to trust in the Father who is drawing us to himself. Believe in the delight God has in looking at each one of us. He sees our frailty, but he also sees our longing and the beauty of our soul made for communion with God.

 

Zacchaeus, wealthy and oppressive at the expense of others, was friendless up to this point in his life. No one of his own people would associate with him. No one, that is, until Jesus came down the road. Suddenly he had the greatest Friend anyone could ever have!

Two things need to be seen here. One was that the Jews had completely misjudged Zacchaeus. The second was that as a result of his encounter with Jesus, Zacchaeus was completely changed. Not only would he make good on any fraud or extortion he had committed, he would see to it that his victims were more than repaid. He went beyond simple restitution and in effect put those whom he had oppressed into standards of living they had never known before.

The encounter incident of Jesus and Zacchaeus teaches us that it is God who justifies us — we can never succeed in our own self-justifications. It is God who sanctifies us, we can never succeed in making ourselves holy. It is God who saves us. We are total failures when it comes to saving ourselves.

If you and I want to have our life changed, then give up the self-delusion that we can change our life. Only God can change our life. And He can do it just as easily as He changed the life of Zacchaeus, that hated and traitorous Jewish tax collector who found holiness in simply responding to God’s invitation. God’s life-changing love is here for us in a way that is infinitely more powerful than the life-changing experience that came to Zacchaeus.

Zacchaeus allowed himself to be found. He did not hide from Jesus. Christ also asks us to let ourselves be found by him. He’s always seeking, but, since we’re free, we have to choose to be found. One of the most powerful ways to do that is the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Christ meets us in a personal encounter of mercy. When we go to confession, Jesus repeats the same words he said in Zacchaeus’ home: “Today salvation has come to this house.” 

 OT XXX: Sir 35:12-14, 16-18; 2 Tm 4:6-8, 16-18; Lk 18:9-14

The famous actor Gregory Peck was once standing in line with a friend, waiting for a table in a crowded Los Angeles restaurant. They had been waiting for some time, the diners seemed to be taking their time eating, and new tables weren’t opening up very fast. They weren’t even that close to the front of the line. Peck’s friend became impatient, and he said to Gregory Peck, “Why don’t you tell them who you are?” Gregory Peck responded with great wisdom. “No,” he said, “if you have to tell them who you are, then you aren’t.” — That’s a lesson that the Pharisee in our Gospel reading apparently had never learned. He thought he had to tell God who he was. He told God that he was not a sinner like the publican standing behind in the temple and therefore God owed him. He thinks he earned the reward and not a gift from God. This attitude is the worst in God’s sight, because no one can really work hard-enough to earn heaven or be in God’s good book. Everything that we get is purely a favor. And it is an unmerited favor. Anyone goes to heaven only by Christ’s sacrificial death on the cross which he did for the sins of the world, and not weighing on anyone’s good works.

G. Savonarola was one of the great preachers of the fifteenth century. He preached in the great cathedral of Florence, Italy, which contained a magnificent marble statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary. When Savonarola started preaching at this great cathedral, he noticed one day an elderly woman praying before this statue of Mary. He then noticed that it was her habit to come every day and pray before the statue. Savonarola remarked one day to an elderly priest who had been serving in the cathedral for many years, “Look how devoted and earnest this woman is. Every day she comes and offers prayers to the blessed Mother of Jesus. What a marvelous act of Faith.” But the elderly priest replied, “Do not be deceived by what you see. Many years ago, when the sculptor needed a model to pose for this statue of the blessed Mother, he hired a beautiful young woman to sit for him. This devout worshiper you see here every day is that young woman. She is worshiping who she used to be.”

A number of people are like that woman. They go to church service to worship themselves. And when they don’t get entertained or not been able to satisfy their ego they feel that their attendance of the service was useless. They feel they got nothing from attending the church and get bored and feel that they had no spiritual upliftment or encounter with the Lord and go home just the same way the Pharisee went back from the temple, unjustified, ungratified. The tax collector actually made a connection with God, but the Pharisee only made a connection with himself.

Before the great spiritual leader Mahatma Gandhi led India in its struggle for independence, he practiced law in South Africa. He became keenly aware of the injustice there, and he managed to persuade the Indian community to offer passive resistance to the government’s policy of discrimination. One incident which impressed itself on his mind was when he was obliged to step into the gutter so that a group of white passers-by would not be contaminated. Reflecting on the experience afterwards he wrote: “It has always been a mystery to me how men feel themselves honored by the humiliation of their fellow beings.” Prophet Muhammad told his followers, when you walk down the street and you see non-Muslims coming up against you, push them down into the gutter because they are not equal to you and Allah does not like them.

Many people have to humiliate other people to make themselves feel better. Their real worth is dependent on other people’s low worth, their demerits. If there is anyone around them superior to themselves in any aspect then they feel inferior and worthless. Only when another person is humiliated they feel better about themselves.

The Pharisee in the parable doesn’t recognize how much he needs God. He won’t receive salvation as a gift, but seems to think that he’s earned it.  The Publican is different. He recognizes that he’s a sinner, and he asks God for forgiveness. He doesn’t even think he’s worthy to raise his eyes to heaven. Instead he prays, “Oh God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

Through the centuries, the tax collector's simple prayer, "O God, be merciful to me, a sinner," has been taken up as a complete summary of Christian spirituality.

There are even cases of monks who made this prayer the only words that they spoke, and reached heights of sanctity by means of it. This prayer makes a connection with God because it recognizes two things. First, it acknowledges God's greatest quality in relation to fallen mankind, His mercy. 

Second, the tax collector's prayer recognizes his need for that mercy. He accuses himself of being a sinner, someone who has selfishly abused God's gifts. The Pharisee's prayer shows no knowledge either of God's mercy or of his need for God; rather, it is an exercise in narcissism, in self-admiration. 

God wants to connect with us, but he can only do so if we let him, and we can't let him if we don't think we need him. The publican’s prayer clearly expresses his need for God. Why are we here in this Church today? Do we need him or do I think He needs me, therefore, I come to Church on Sunday. If only we trust in the great mercy of God can we really be filled by God and his gifts. Like the publican let’s also tell from the heart, Be merciful to me, a sinner, O Lord.

 

 

OT XXIX [C] Ex 17:8-13, II Tm 3:14–4:2, Lk 18:1-8

 

The first reading today is about Moses commanding Joshua to attack the Amalekites and while Moses prayed with raised hands the Israelites were winning; when his hands were going down they were losing. Persevering prayer is one of the key themes of all the readings today. But I would like to focus on something different. Why would God ask Moses to attack Amalekites, and later them and some other countries, to exterminate totally?

God commands us to love and forgive one another, even our enemies. And one of the Ten Commandments tells us not to kill (Ex 20:13). So, is what God commanded against the Canaanites and Amalekites a contradiction?

In 1 Samuel 15:2-3, God commanded Saul and the Israelites, “This is what the LORD Almighty says: 'I will punish the Amalekites for what they did to Israel when they waylaid them as they came up from Egypt. The Amalekites were a source of constant woe to Israel. Shortly after the Israelites left Egypt, the Amalekites attacked the weary people, slaughtering the weak and elderly (Deut 25:18). The Amalekites and Canaanites, among other nations, practiced child burning, torture as public entertainment, and sexual immorality as sports.
Therefore, God said, go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them. Do not spare them (Deut 2:34; 3:6; 20:16-18). Why would God have the Israelites exterminate an entire group of people, women and children included?

We do not fully understand why God would command such a thing, but we trust God that He is just – and we recognize that we are incapable of fully understanding a sovereign, infinite, and eternal God. As we look at difficult issues such as this one, we must remember what God says, “My ways are higher than your ways and My thoughts are higher than your thoughts..”( Is 55:9; Rom 11:33-36). We have to be willing to trust God and have faith in Him even when we do not understand His ways.

Unlike us, God knows the future. God knew what the results would be if Israel did not completely eradicate the Amalekites. If Israel did not carry out God’s orders, the Amalekites would come back to trouble the Israelites in the future. King Saul was commanded to exterminate the Amalekites. He claimed to have killed everyone except the Amalekite king Agag (1 Sam 15:20). He brought some animals to sacrifice to God, as if doing a big favor to God. God told him, I desire obedience to sacrifice. Israel was then later plagued with continuous Amalekite raids (Ex 17; 1 Sam 15:2; Num 14:45) as a result of Saul’s not obeying God. Just a couple of decades later, there were enough Amalekites to take David and his men’s families captive (1 Sam 30:1-2). After David and his men attacked the Amalekites and rescued their families, 400 Amalekites escaped. If Saul had fulfilled what God had commanded him, this never would have occurred. Several hundred years later, a descendant of Agag, Haman, tried to have the entire Jewish people exterminated (book of Esther). So, Saul’s incomplete obedience almost resulted in Israel’s destruction. God knew this would occur, so He ordered the extermination of the Amalekites ahead of time.

 It’s helpful to keep in mind that nations like the Canaanites and Amalekites engaged in human sacrifice, even offering their children to devil gods. (Deut 12:31). God did not order the extermination of these people to be cruel, but to prevent even greater evil from occurring in the future.

Often infected cattle or poultry are destroyed for the purpose of stopping an epidemic and saving vastly more livestock. Likewise, left unchecked, these nations would have plagued the world with such depravity that they simply were not redeemable. Not many people have issues with God destroying the whole world with flood because the whole world was corrupt except Noah and his family. We have problem when God using instruments like king Saul or Joshua.

Not only did God use Israel’s might to punish evil nations like these, He used the Babylonian, Assyrian, and Egyptian kings to punish Israel. When the Assyrian city of Ninevah was willing to repent hearing Jonah’s preaching he abstained from punishing them. God will often use human forces to mete out His discipline. Sometimes a more wicked nation is used as instrument to punish a less wicked nation.

The Amalekites are viewed as an existential threat, not simply to Israel, but to the covenant promises of God; that he will bless the whole world through his chosen people as promised to Abraham.  The Amalekites are not simply a threatening people with their determination to wipe out Israel, but they are a threat to the salvation plan of God for all other nations.  As descendants of Esau they had despised the covenant themselves and now were determined that none others could have access to what they had rejected.  

 

The promise to Abraham wouldn’t be fulfilled until the “fourth generation” because “the iniquity of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure” (Gen. 15:16). God knew that the people of the land of Canaan would continue in their sin, but he was not yet going to exercise judgment on them because their sin had not reached the level to which He was ready to administer judgment. There is a lot of mystery here, but I think we must understand that God never commanded the Israelites to attack any peoples whom he had not considered it morally right to judge because of the pure evil of their actions. We have to trust God in this.

The Canaanite Conquest was unique. This was a Yahweh War. These were not just enemies of Israel, but enemies of God. God was the “commander-in-chief,” and he decided how the people and the spoils of war were to be dealt with because it was his own war accomplished through human agents (in this case, Saul and his army). These wars were limited and are in no way meant to be a model for the people of God after they settled in the Promised Land or for God’s New Testament people.

Probably the most difficult part of these commands from God is that God ordered the death of children and infants as well. Why would God order the death of innocent children?

These children would have likely grown up as adherents to the evil religions and practices of their parents and these children would naturally have grown up resentful of the Israelites and later sought to avenge the “unjust” treatment of their parents.

Many skeptics use it as a weapon to discourage belief. They say, “I wouldn’t do anything like that, so God shouldn’t either.” But the framework of the Bible is that God is indeed sovereign, just, and competent, which is exactly why writers left the story in. God wasn’t hiding, and He’s hoping people come to Him for the answer.

Paul is advising Timothy in the second reading “All Scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for refutation, for correction, and for training in righteousness, so that one who belongs to God may be competent, equipped for every good work. Therefore, scripture even when we do not fully understand, keep seeking to know it. As God inspired the writers of the scripture will continue inspiring us too.

 

 

OT XXVIII [C]: II Kgs 5:14-17; II Tm 2:8-13; Lk 17:11-19

In ancient Israel, nothing was more pitiable than a leper. They were prohibited from entering any town, since the disease was so contagious. They had to continuously shout “Unclean!” so people knew a leper was approaching and could clear the area. They couldn’t come within 50 yards of a healthy person. Theirs was a life of total isolation: no friendship, no sense of belonging, no affection. And in today’s gospel we meet 10 of them. They stood off at a distance and shouted to Jesus, “Jesus, master, have pity on us!” And Jesus heard them.

He told them to go and show themselves to the priests. In Jewish law a priest had to declare someone free from leprosy before that person could re-enter society. And on their way to the priest, the 10 were healed.  But only one of them realized that he’d been healed, and returned to thank Jesus and glorify God. Isn’t that amazing? Leprosy is a painful disease, and if you were healed you would notice. The other 9 simply took the healing for granted, and didn’t realize the incredible gift they’d just received.

G.K. Chesterton once said: “When it comes to life the critical thing is whether you take things for granted or take them with gratitude.”

Gratitude opens our hearts to God and to others. Gratitude makes us more fully human. Gratitude sets our minds on eternity. Gratitude is the secret to true flourishing both as individuals and as a society.  This is the great lesson from today’s gospel. Receive the gifts of God with gratitude.

Although we receive so much from Him, we often take everything as our due, without recognizing and appreciating that everything we have or receive is His free gift. We are often thankful only when we compare ourselves with less fortunate people. In times of need, we pray with desperate intensity, but as time passes, we forget God.

The virtue of gratitude helps us experience the interior joy that comes from knowing we are loved by God, without limits or conditions. It is such an important virtue, that God put it at the very center of Christian worship: the celebration of the Eucharist. This is why we don't just to stay home and say some prayers, or to go to the mountains and enjoy the view. Those are good things to do. But what happens here, in this community and on this altar, goes much, much deeper.

Fr. Roger Landry beautifully explains the connection between the Holy Mass and Jesus’ thanksgiving. At every Mass we’re called to grow in this spirit of thanksgiving, because the Eucharist is Jesus’ own prayer of Thanksgiving to the Father. The Greek word from which we derive the word “Eucharist” means “thanksgiving.” During the Mass, the priest says, “Let us give thanks to the Lord our God.” Everyone responds, “It is right and just.” And then the priest replies with a saying of great theological depth: “It is truly right and just, our duty and our salvation, always and everywhere to give you thanks, Lord, Holy Father, almighty and eternal God.” 

He gave thanks because it would be through his passion, death, and Resurrection, that Jesus would institute the means by which we would be able to enter into his own relationship with the Father. The Mass is the school in which we participate in Jesus’ own thanksgiving, the thanksgiving the Church makes continuously from the rising of the sun to its setting.

Gratitude makes us more like God, and opens our hearts to a deeper relationship with him. We must be grateful to God for everything, even suffering, for that is a means of sanctification and love for God Incarnate Who suffered for us and all mankind.

This week, let's warm someone else's heart by saying thank you. We owe a debt of gratitude to so many people:

our parents, first of all; our teachers and coaches, and all those people who dedicated themselves to us in our years of education; our first boss, who was patient with us and gave us a second chance; the relative or neighbor who inspired us with their good example; the soldiers who have fought to protect our freedom; the police, firefighters, and statesmen who dedicate themselves to keeping our communities safe and prosperous.....

 

Jesus has reminded us today that gratitude is a Christian virtue, that his followers should spread the aroma of gratitude in this thankless world, for our own good, and for the good of those around us. Today, when he comes to us in Holy Communion, let's promise him that this week we'll follow his directions and will be grateful like the Samaritan who returned to thank him or like Naaman the Syrian; and follow the example of the Virgin Mary who demonstrated her gratefulness to God through her obedience and Faith.