Today’s gospel is a jewel, a real gem, containing a parable that is pithy, giving us much food for thought without a wasted word, and pungent, leaving us with a message that stings, pricks, and bites. A parable that could well bear the notice: ‘Warning: the preacher-general has determined that this parable can be dangerous to your religious self-esteem.”
Luke tells us the obvious lesson: exalt yourself and you will be humbled; humble yourself and you will be exalted. This parable urges us to examine our relationship with God and one another. One writer best summarized the story by saying, “Two men went up to the temple to pray. One did and the other didn’t.”
The tax collector prayed while the Pharisee stood there offering an assessment of his sanctity. On the surface, the Pharisee appears to be praying, but all he really did was exalt himself. How odd, given that Pharisees were known for their piety. While this one could be easily commended for being very religious in what he did, he saw little need to actually pray to God. The Pharisee was oblivious to his sin of pride. In contrast, the tax collector faces the painful truth about himself and quietly ask God to have mercy on him.
Obviously, the prayers of the tax collector and the Pharisee were very different. The Pharisee was fulfilling an obligation in the Law to worship. He stressed the point that he was doing more than the law required of him. To emphasize this, he pointed to the tax collector, “I certainly am a lot better than that guy over there.” His ‘holier than thou attitude’ can’t be missed.
The tax collector didn’t make any comparisons, nor did he try to remind God of any of the good things he had done in his life. He didn’t say, “I know I’ve done wrong, collecting taxes from my own people for the Romans and making a profit on it for myself, but I also fed my neighbor’s family when he died suddenly, and I routinely give alms to beggars.” Nor did he say, “Lord, I am not an arrogant man, like that Pharisee.” His prayer was simply, “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.”
Catholicism is often accused of putting people on guilt trips. I do not agree. Catholicism puts people on reality trips. Catholicism dares to speak about unpopular topics like sin. Ours is not a “feel good” religion. Instead, Catholicism dares to invite people to consider their own participation in sin and seek forgiveness. Catholicism recognizes that our salvation is a process we are engaged in. We are not saved yet, we are in the process of being saved. Our Church recognizes that we are human beings and that we can give in to the temptation to sin. Our Church also tells us that the Lord was one of us. He experienced what temptation was like and he fully understands our need for mercy. He gives the sacrament of mercy, penance, because he wants his mercy, not our guilt, directing our lives.
God is determined to form a relationship with each of us. So often, however, we have run from Him. When we realize that God has chosen us as individuals, that He loves each of us, and when we consider how we have resisted Him, we realize that our prayer must begin with, “Have mercy on me a sinner.”
Contrary to what many Catholics think, our Church is not concerned with guilt but in my ministry I find that to be a hard lesson to sell. Perhaps that is due to negative experiences you may have had years ago in the confessional. Or it may be that you subconsciously think like the Pharisee and don’t really see yourself as a sinner. More than once, penitents have come to me seeking absolution but they are at a loss to confess to any wrongdoing. Their mindset reminds me of a classmate in the seminary who would sometimes sing, “O Lord, its hard to be humble when you are as perfect as me.” While we may not see ourselves as being perfect, we often fail to see how much we have in common with one another. Namely, being human, we all make mistakes, we all fall prey to temptation, we all sin at one time or another, and we all need God’s mercy.
Last Christmas, someone gave me a book by an American priest who had been incarcerated in Siberia for decades. Fr. Walter Ciszek compared himself to the Pharisee at one point. He wrote, “I was ashamed because I knew in my heart that I had tried to do too much on my own, and I had asked for God’s help but had really believed in my own ability to avoid evil and to meet every challenge…The sense of guilt and shame I felt was rooted in my failure to put grace ahead of nature, my failure to trust primarily in God rather than in my own powers.”
Jose Gomez, the recently appointed coadjutor Archbishop of Los Angeles, made this observation that ties in well with the gospel. “Ultimately, what we all must learn is that no matter what our gifts, abilities, and training, no matter how hard we work, and no matter what we are able to achieve, everything is a gift from God in Christ Jesus, and God alone is the true source of our strength and power in this life. Learning this lesson is the beginning of growing in Christian character.”
Archbishop Gomez raises the point that few of us have been taught the virtue of living humbly. Instead we value our uniqueness and emphasize what sets us apart like the Pharisee, but that is not what enriches our relationship with God or, for that matter, with others. Jesus challenges us to embrace the humble, God-centered faith of the tax collector, not the self-centered and self-important claims of the Pharisee. We give thanks for God’s love for us by returning that love to one another, and by accepting one another as God has accepted us. We honor God as Father of us all by honoring one another as brothers and sisters. Real prayer seeks first and only the grace to do that.