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Daily Scripture

Sunday March 21, 2010

In You, O Lord, Justice and Mercy Meet

Today’s gospel reading triggered off in my memory the number of times I have jumped the gun by passing judgment on someone before knowing all the facts — the soft data as well as the hard data. It’s clear to me now that prejudice and bias covered up by pride have a great deal to do with this jump; our comrades can do no wrong; our foes can do no right! Of course, it’s easy to meet out mercy to those we like and easier to meet out justice to those we don’t like.

The words of Isaiah introduce the theme of mercy and pave the way for the encounter of Jesus with the adulterous woman recorded in the gospel of John. The people of Israel had prostituted themselves if not in truth, at least metaphorically. God had espoused himself to them, for better or worse for richer or poorer forever. It was an irrevocable covenant that remains to this day. The people of Israel to whom Isaiah addressed these words abandoned their God and aligned themselves with foreign powers for political and economic gain. In effect, they entered an adulterous alliance and were literally carried away to a foreign land by their greed and lust for power.

In the name of their God, a disciple of Isaiah writing in his name and style reminds them of the great exodus when God led the people out of Egypt through the Red Sea into the Land of Canaan, the land they called home for centuries. In words similar to these, the prophet declares, “You think that was great? Forget about it; you ain’t seen noth’in yet! I’m about to do something even more spectacular. I’ll pave a way through the wilderness and bring you home again. I will forgive your unfaithfulness and forget your affair. Your misery will meet mercy and you will be saved.”

It has been said that pride is the worst of all sins because it distorts the truth of who we are. In fact, pride is a lie. But more than this it is a distortion of who God is. Recall that the sin of Adam and Eve was not that they wanted to be like God but that they did not recognize that they were already like God — made in God’s image and likeness.

There was another encounter taking place in John’s story beyond that of the meeting between Jesus and the woman. It was between Jesus and the woman’s accusers. In was in this encounter that justice was enjoined to the ‘trial’. “Let the one who is without sin be the first to cast the stone!” Their pride blinded them to their own sins. Jesus exposed their hypocrisy as his mercy engulfed the sinful woman.

Was he being soft on sin? Hardly. “Go now”, he said to the woman “and avoid this sin.” Might we not rightly assume that this initiative of mercy effected a dramatic change in her life? God’s saving grace was fully manifested in Jesus. Oddly enough, the same mercy resulted in the hardening of her accusers. They drifted away one by one from the eldest to the youngest but they sought another opportunity to trick him into mercy mending.

John’s story about the woman caught in the act of adultery revealed the depth to which Jesus extended himself to the sinner. “In you, O Lord, justice and mercy meet! [Psalm 85] or in the words of St. Augustine, “Misery meets mercy” in the person of Jesus.

Lent is about opening ourselves up to the saving grace of God but repentance is not something we do. It is allowing the forgiving power of God to touch our life, indeed, to engulf us and point us in a new direction. It’s about God empowering us to goodness and about our initiating a new pattern of life.

Lent is also about dropping stones and the acceptance of the humanity of others, despite their sins and failures. It is about entrusting others and ourselves to the tender mercy of God. More than that, it is about allowing ourselves to become conduits of God’s mercy and saving grace—helping others to find their way out of the wilderness of failure, sin and rejection.

“To err is human; to forgive is divine.”

At the same time, to forgive is not so much an act of the will as a disposition of the heart and in many situations, the conclusion of a very long process. We dare not be presumptuous or simplistic about it.

Forgiveness does not absolve the sinner from taking responsibility for the sin or from its consequences. Thus the mantra, “There is no forgiveness without justice, no justice without truth, no truth without full accountability.”

Here is the story that a rabbi colleague shared with me many years ago. A man went into the temple for the observance of Yom Kippur, which is the Jewish observance of atonement. As he entered the Temple, he noticed all his sins were listed on the board at the entrance. He tried to erase them but he was unable to do so. Then he went inside to participate in the penitential service. As he left the temple, he attempted once more to erase his sins but again was unable to do so. He departed and set about making amends for his sins and then returned to the temple. Lo and behold, his sins had disappeared.

This story is akin to the teaching of Jesus, “When you are bringing your gift to the altar and recall that your brother or sister has something against you, go first to be reconciled and then return with your gift.”

The Scriptures set the tone not only for our Lenten journey but also for our life long journey. Our destiny is not Jerusalem the earthly city but Jerusalem the heavenly city. Mercy is our mission but we must first pass through the gateway of justice and truth. In you O Lord, justice and mercy meet and when they do, reconciliation is complete.

Daily Scripture Archive»

Articles in the category "pastor's study"

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This is a statement of my formal acceptance of the ‘Priest of Integrity Award’ that is to be conferred on…Read full entry

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The latest article in category pastor's study

Third Sunday in Lent 'A'

Saturday March 6, 2010

Conduits of Grace

What would we do without water? Sixty percent of the composition of our body is water. We can live for several weeks without food but without water for only several days. We are well on the path to dehydration at the first sign of thirst. Healthy people drink six to eight glasses of water daily!

Several years ago during a long New Jersey drought, I had the opportunity to banter about the weather with a few friends. One of our them suggested that I initiate some special prayers for rain at daily Mass, to which I responded, ‘tongue-in-cheek’ of course, “So God doesn’t know we need rain?” We all chuckled but agreed that perhaps it would not be a bad idea to remind God about our dire thirst!

Of course, God really does not need the reminder; we do. That is, we need to be reminded that our partnership with God endures in good times and bad, in the rainy months and in the dry seasons. We rejoice when the garden yields a rich harvest as if success is the work of our hands rather than God’s. But when the drought occurs, we turn to God for a miracle or at least for a direct intervention instead of investing even more heavily in our partnership with God. In dry seasons, we need to use less water so that others may have sufficient. Although we cannot control the laws of nature, we can control our use of the earth’s resources and we can respect the earth’s watersheds and flood plains by not putting God to the test with structures that cannot withstand the ravages of hurricanes and floods.

The Israelites complained about their thirst in the desert. They assumed that God had hardened his heart toward them and they blamed Moses for leading them out to the desert to die. In fact it was the ungrateful Israelites who had hardened their hearts against God so quickly forgetting their liberation from Egypt and the cruel pharaoh.

The storyteller appreciated the natural drama provided by nature and took advantage of the occasion to teach a lesson not only to the Israelites but also to people of all ages. God did indeed hear their grumbling but did not hold it against them, and through Moses led them to water at the rock. Despite Moses’ hesitation, God provided water that not only quenched their thirst but also healed them of their self-absorption. God knew of their thirst before their grumbling. The rock was a metaphor for God and the water a metaphor for divine life.

In the gospel story, Jesus knew of the thirst of the woman long before she arrived at the well. The interesting exchange between Jesus and the woman so cleverly woven by John into the journey of Jesus to Jerusalem makes it quite clear that the narration is not about water but about living in God’s grace through the Spirit that has been poured out on all humanity. Jesus becomes the rock from which flow the living waters of God’s grace. In the words of the psalmist, “He is the rock of our salvation.” [Psalm 95]

The story is full of signs and metaphors. Water is a rich symbol in both the Old and New Testaments. In the 12th chapter of Isaiah, the prophet states, “With joy, you will draw water from the wells of salvation.” And in chapter 44, “I will pour water on the thirsty land.” And in chapter 55, “Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the water and drink without cost.” Ezekiel and Zechariah also speak of water flowing in the desert.

The Samaritan woman represented a race and cast rejected by the Jews. The five husbands were the religions imposed on the Samaritans by foreign powers. There is a clear progression of faith in the woman as she and Jesus conversed about water. She came to see in Jesus what his disciples failed to see and she became a conduit of grace to the other members of the Samaritan community.

As the conversation continued with his disciples, it became clear that Jesus’ agenda was quite different from that of his disciples. They had not yet caught on that God’s word was his food and God’s will was his drink. His rebuke of Satan in the desert was reinforced by his total submission to God’s will.

These scriptural texts were selected for this weekend to support the progress of catechumens toward baptism and entrance into the Church, the living Rock, the Body of Christ. During Lent, catechumens and candidates already baptized in another Christian assembly begin their final ‘ascent’ toward baptism and/or entrance into full communion with the Roman Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil. How appropriate that they should spend this remaining time reflecting on how God’s grace has been working in their lives over an extended period of time—for some, many years! This speaks of the relentless energy of a life-giving God, the ‘hound of heaven’ as it were, leaving no ‘rock’ unturned to raise us to a consciousness of our connection with him. Baptism will be for catechumens a re-birth. The renewal of vows and Confirmation will be for candidates (already baptized in another Christian tradition) will be a kind of re-birth, a fresh start, the re-ignition of the Spirit that they received at baptism.

We, who were baptized into the Church one ten or a hundred years ago also take advantage of this period of scrutiny to search our souls and allow God’s grace to prevail in our lives. We are challenged to allow God to unleash the saving graces that perhaps have lain dormant or covered over by our grumbling and complaining; by our self-absorption in our own picayune agendas. The word ‘scrutiny’ does not mean obsessive introspection. It is rather an honest inventory of our lives—our intentions and motivations in the light of God’s love, not God’s anger. We are slow learners. We find it difficult that God should respond to our feeble efforts and our grumbling with compassion and even more graces, but the Scriptures verify this categorically.

We do not need to “pray for rain” or for sunshine. We need rather to allow God to raise our consciousness to the partnership that we enjoy with God, a partnership which began at birth, the moment when we were loved into existence.

In his letter to the Romans, Paul states: “Since we were justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand and we boast of our hope of sharing the glory [i.e., partnership] with God.”

The corollary to all this, of course, is that day by day, we are becoming ‘conduits’ of God’s saving grace to others, God working through us, as it were, bringing mercy and compassion to troubled hearts and warring nations.

As we enter the church each Sunday during Lent and dip our fingers into the holy water font, we find no water. In fact, the fonts are covered with a purple strip to remind us of our thirst for divine grace and mercy.

Whether we pray or grumble, God will be there for us. Jesus provides living water each time we come to this table.

We are also to be there for others who are thirsty for God’s love whoever they are, wherever they live, whatever their story.

In Christ, we have become conduits of God’s grace.