THIRTIETH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME

[cappie]

We see in the Liturgy today one of Scripture’s abiding themes—that God “knows no favourites,” as today’s First Reading tells us (see 2 Chronicles 19:7; Acts 10:34-35; Romans 2:11). God cannot be bribed (Deuteronomy 10:17). We cannot curry favour with Him or impress Him—even with our good deeds or our faithful observance of religious duties such as tithing and fasting.

There is a prayer by Jacqueline Bergan and S Marie Schwann in the book "Love: a guide for prayer", it says, “Lord my God, when Your loved spilled over into creation You thought of me. I am from love, of love, for love.” What an amesome claim! When God first created, God did it with us in mind. In fact, the reason for creation itself was so God could create us in order to receive God’s love, to participate in God’s love. We are no afterthoughts, no accidents. God made us from love, of love, for love.

Will we accept that love?

The prayer is beautiful, but it presents a challenge. “Lord my God, when your love spilled over into creation, you thought of me” Really? Isn’t that a little too much? A little over-stated? Can it actually be a fact that not only is there a God, and not only is the nature of God love, but the divine love that threw the stars and moulded the dry land and set all the protons and neutrons and quarks and photons humming and buzzing–that divine love is actually directed at us? Us in particular. And God is just longing to love us and rain down on us an abundance of grace and favour, and all we need to do is receive it? Can that really be? Somehow, we get this idea we have to be worthy of being loved. We have to deserve it, earn it. We turn the question, “Do you love me?” into “What must I do to be worthy of love?”

We do know human love is less than perfect. We know, all too well, that the well of human love can run dry. And we project our small human experiences of finite love onto God. And the result is we think we must be worthy of love, including God’s, and this attendant heresy: God’s only got so much love to give.

Rather than thinking of God as God is known in our scripture and our liturgy and our faith tradition, as the source of all love, we think of God’s love meted out in teaspoons full, eyedroppers full, and we need to qualify, even compete, to get some of it.

So, when we hear today’s parable, of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector, we all too easily hear this interpretation: A Pharisee says his prayers in the temple. He is prideful and self-congratulatory. A Tax collector also says his prayers, but, unlike the Pharisee, he is humble. The moral of the story is: be humble like the Tax Collector. Be like the Tax Collector and you too will be able to say, Thank God I’m not like that Pharisee!

And there’s the trap, this is not a parable about winning God’s love. Rather, it’s a story in which two unlike characters standing before God and who are much the same. They both need God’s love and forgiveness. They are both loved and forgiven by God. The difference is that one is open to receiving that love and one is not. The Pharisee’s prayer is more of a progress report: Dear God, just wanted you to know, I’m doing quite well thank you. I give more than I need to; I’m keeping the commandments; I’m well-regarded in the community. The Pharisee asks nothing of God, and goes home with nothing.

On the other hand, there is the tax collector, a traitor to his community, making money supporting the occupying Roman forces. For some reason, this tax collector comes into the temple knowing he needs God’s love and mercy. He has done nothing to earn. He is not deserving of it. He just needs it, and asks for it. And he goes home aware of the abundant love flowing down on both himself and the Pharisee. But where the tax collector has opened up his heart and allowed God’s love and mercy to wash over him, the Pharisee has cloaked himself in a bubble of self-sufficiency, and all of the love of God, just runs right off him.

The response to God’s love is to accept it, treasure it and find as many ways as we can to give it away, to live out the image of God stamped on every one of us, the image of a God of abundant love, to open our hands and hearts and to use every means at our disposal to share this love with others.

In church, we practice accepting that love by gathering at God’s table saying, we need this food. We practice giving that love by praying for people, some of whom we don’t even know. We practice giving that love by making our offerings of ourselves through our money, our talents, our gifts. We practice giving that love by going forth from this place rejoicing in the power of the Spirit, to love and serve the Lord.

The Love that moves the sun and the stars, the Love that creates, sustains, and redeems the world, is always saying “Yes” to our question “Do you love me?” The only thing we need to do is open ourselves to that love. In the end, as we see ourselves in this gospel mirror, we see we are bathed in God’s grace, sinful as we are. And that is the best reason to give God thanks.