June 8, 2008, 10th Sunday of Ordinary Time
Hosea 6:3-6 Roman 4:18-25 Matthew 9:9-13
To the churched and unchurched[1]
gathered in a church not built by human hands[2]
First reading from Hosea 6:3-6
In their affliction, people will say: “Let us try to know the Lord. He will come to us as surely as the day dawns, as surely as the spring rains fall upon the earth.” But the Lord says, “Israel and Judah, what am I going to do with you? Your religious spirit disappears as quickly as morning mist; it is like dew that vanishes early in the day. That is why I have sent my prophets to you with my message of judgment and destruction. What I want from you people is plain and clear: I want love and mercy from you, not your animal sacrifices. I would rather have my people know me than have them burn offerings to me.”
Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Matthew 9:9-13
Glory to you, Lord.
As Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man named Matthew. He was a tax collector sitting at his booth. Jesus said to him, “Follow me.” And he got up and followed him. While He was at table in Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat with Jesus and his disciples. The Pharisees saw this and said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” He heard this and said, “Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do. Go and learn the meaning of the scripture which says, ‘What I want from you is plain and clear: I want love and mercy from you, not your animal sacrifices.’ I did not come to call the righteous but sinners.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
Introduction
The call to discipleship
We have rounded off the liturgical cycle with the feast of Pentecost (Jesus’ gift to us of His Holy Spirit) and the feast of Corpus Christi (Jesus’ gift of Himself in the Eucharist). Both gifts are in fulfillment of His promise not to leave us orphans as He ascended into heaven. (Jn 14:18) Now we are in a six-month period of Ordinary Time with its color green, which will take us through the warm summer months into late fall until November 30, 2008. Then we will begin the liturgical cycle all over again with the first Sunday of Advent in preparation for Christmas 2008.
The scripture readings at Mass during this period are lessons on discipleship – on the following of Jesus. In the gospel reading for this 10th Sunday of Ordinary time, Jesus sees Matthew, a tax collector, sitting at his booth and invites him to be his disciple. Matthew immediately gets up and follows Jesus. Later on, when Jesus and His disciples are having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners join them at table. The Pharisees seeing this complain to Jesus’ disciples saying, “How come your master eats with tax collectors and sinners?”(Mt 9:11)
“Tax collectors & sinners”
When Rome occupied the land of Jesus, it hired Jews to collect export taxes from fellow Jews. Naturally these Jews were considered traitors. Many of them were also extortionists. So in the New Testament tax collector and sinner are frequently mentioned in the same breath. Complaining one day about cantankerous people, Jesus said, “John the Baptist comes fasting and drinking no wine, and everyone says, `He has a demon in him!’ Then I, the Son of Man, come eating and drinking, and everyone says, `Look at this man, will you! He is a glutton and wine-drinker, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’” (Mt 11:18-19) On another occasion Jesus berated the chief priests and Jewish elders saying, “I tell you that tax collectors and sinners (prostitutes included) are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you people. John the Baptist came preaching and they listened to him, but you fellows did not.” (Mt 21:32)
When Jesus heard the Pharisees were complaining that He ate with tax collectors and sinners, He told them, “Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do. Go and learn the meaning of the prophet Hosea’s words, `It is not your animal sacrifices and gifts that I want from you people. What I want from you is mercy and compassion.’” Then He added, “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mt 9:11; Hosea 6:6)
Jesus quotes Hosea again
That quote from Hosea must have been a favorite of Jesus; he used it on another occasion. One Sabbath the apostles were on their way to the synagogue. They had not eaten breakfast and were hungry. As they passed by a field of ripened wheat, they began to pick the grain and eat it. That was a violation of Jewish laws concerning food preparation on the Sabbath. The Pharisees complained to Jesus saying, “How come your disciples do what it is forbidden to do on the Sabbath!” Jesus responded, “Have you not read what David did when he and his men were hungry? How he and his men went into the house of God and ate the bread which only priests were allowed to eat.” (I Sam 21:6; Lv 24:5-9) To the Pharisees He quoted the same passage from Hosea, saying, “Go and learn the meaning of the prophet’s word, ‘It is not your animal sacrifices and gifts that I want from you people. What I want from you is mercy and compassion.’” Then he added, “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mt 12:1-8; Hosea 6:6)
Righteousness & Sinfulness
Some years ago, Anglican William Coats wrote an article in an Anglican diocesan newspaper about the event which sent the Archbishop of Milwaukee into fast retirement amid a cloud of sexual scandal. In the article Coats claimed that we Roman Catholics have it all wrong when it comes to righteousness and sinfulness. He characterized his article as “incendiary” and said to a Roman Catholic friend, “It is a bit anti-Roman Catholic, but you will have to live with that.”
Coats maintained that if the Roman Church had had in place a right theology and spirituality about righteousness and sinfulness it could have spared much spiritual anguish for the church of the Milwaukee Archdiocese and its faithful, when the sexual scandal broke into the news media. In his article he referred to a homily preached by a priest in the cathedral. The homily, Coats said, pretended to “comfort” the faithful. It condemned the Archbishop’s sexual affair and the hush money involved, and it asked for mercy and forgiveness upon the Archbishop who, the homilist said, “had fallen from grace.”
“The fall from grace”
In exasperation Coats exclaimed, “This is far too much for me to take!” He explained his exasperation by claiming that there is a strain in Roman Catholic theology which sees human beings as born good, but who “fall from grace” when they commit certain sins. That, he exclaimed, is so much nonsense! The Archbishop, he said, did not fall from some goodness. He started out from where we all start out -- from a human mixture of good and evil. Then he quoted the words of the Apostle Paul, “I tell you, not one of us is righteous; no, not one…. We have all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. “ (Rm 3: 11, 23)
That quote, Coats maintained, does not refer to a moment of sexual weakness which then means disgrace. Rather, it refers to the daily lot of us all. We all know our failures. We all know what we could have done but did not do. We all know what we have done badly. We all know the deceit that is in us. We all know our own cover-up jobs. The idea that one sexual sin somehow besmirches a clean record is pure nonsense, he wrote. The Archbishop and all of us besmirch our records everyday in big and small ways, in ways sometimes hidden and sometimes exposed.
In the article Anglican Coats maintained that had this kind of theology and spirituality been alive and well in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee when scandal broke upon it, there would not have been so much self-righteousness in some, or so much need for cover-up in others, or so much anguish in the hearts of many faithful. He wrapped up his article very neatly and niftily with one shining line: We humans do not fall from grace; we fall into grace.
The fall into grace!
After the Parable of the Good Samaritan, the Parable of the Prodigal Son ranks next in my book. What Jesus said of the two greatest commandments can be said of these two great parables, "On these two depend the whole Law and the Prophets." (Mt 22:40)
The Prodigal Son is a disobedient young man who wonders off into a foreign land where he squanders his inheritance on parties and prostitutes. With time, however, he is reduced to slopping the pigs for a gentile farmer. He decides then to turn his life around and make his way back to his father’s house. The father is an incredibly loving man who for months and years looks off to the horizon for any sign of his son returning. When finally one day he spies his son still a long way off, he runs out to meet him. At that moment, the son falls into grace! He falls into the open arms of his father. The father wraps his son’s bare body in a rich robe. He places a ruby ring on his finger and soft sandals on his calloused feet. Then he orders the fatted calf to be slaughtered for a banquet to celebrate a son who was lost but now has been found. (Lk 15:1-32)
The parable has sometimes been called also the Parable of the Prodigal Father. It can also be called the Parable of Man’s Fall into Grace.
Conclusion
Our fall into Amazing Grace
Anglican Coats takes a parting slam at the Roman Church saying, “The Roman Catholic Church certainly has a right to preach and practice whatever theology it wants to, but as the dominant religion in this country it often gives the impression that its view is the Christian point of view. As a child of the Reformation and as an Anglican I say, No, it is not!”
Man’s fall into grace is so wonderful that the Reformation sang of it with all its might in its hymn of hymns -- Amazing Grace.
“Amazing Grace, how sweet the soundthat saved a wretch like me.I once was lost but now am found,was blind but now I see.”
This parable of Man’s Fall into Grace is read on the 24th Sunday of Ordinary Time in liturgical Cycle C. After that, this magnificent gem falls silent for two whole years! It is not proclaimed in Cycle A or B. Imagine, the Sunday assembly is deprived of hearing such good news about our sinful selves for two whole years! And when, at last, this great parable is finally proclaimed in Cycle C, there are brackets in the missalette indicating a shortened reading of the parable! Imagine, wanting to shorten such a gem! Tell whoever proclaims the gospel that day to forget about the brackets. Tell him that we sinners have all the time in the world to listen to such good news about our fall into Amazing Grace.
[1]] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church has left!
[2] Acts of the Apostles 17:24
Hosea 6:3-6 Roman 4:18-25 Matthew 9:9-13
To the churched and unchurched[1]
gathered in a church not built by human hands[2]
First reading from Hosea 6:3-6
In their affliction, people will say: “Let us try to know the Lord. He will come to us as surely as the day dawns, as surely as the spring rains fall upon the earth.” But the Lord says, “Israel and Judah, what am I going to do with you? Your religious spirit disappears as quickly as morning mist; it is like dew that vanishes early in the day. That is why I have sent my prophets to you with my message of judgment and destruction. What I want from you people is plain and clear: I want love and mercy from you, not your animal sacrifices. I would rather have my people know me than have them burn offerings to me.”
Alleluia, alleluia.
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Matthew 9:9-13
Glory to you, Lord.
As Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man named Matthew. He was a tax collector sitting at his booth. Jesus said to him, “Follow me.” And he got up and followed him. While He was at table in Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and sat with Jesus and his disciples. The Pharisees saw this and said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” He heard this and said, “Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do. Go and learn the meaning of the scripture which says, ‘What I want from you is plain and clear: I want love and mercy from you, not your animal sacrifices.’ I did not come to call the righteous but sinners.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
Introduction
The call to discipleship
We have rounded off the liturgical cycle with the feast of Pentecost (Jesus’ gift to us of His Holy Spirit) and the feast of Corpus Christi (Jesus’ gift of Himself in the Eucharist). Both gifts are in fulfillment of His promise not to leave us orphans as He ascended into heaven. (Jn 14:18) Now we are in a six-month period of Ordinary Time with its color green, which will take us through the warm summer months into late fall until November 30, 2008. Then we will begin the liturgical cycle all over again with the first Sunday of Advent in preparation for Christmas 2008.
The scripture readings at Mass during this period are lessons on discipleship – on the following of Jesus. In the gospel reading for this 10th Sunday of Ordinary time, Jesus sees Matthew, a tax collector, sitting at his booth and invites him to be his disciple. Matthew immediately gets up and follows Jesus. Later on, when Jesus and His disciples are having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners join them at table. The Pharisees seeing this complain to Jesus’ disciples saying, “How come your master eats with tax collectors and sinners?”(Mt 9:11)
“Tax collectors & sinners”
When Rome occupied the land of Jesus, it hired Jews to collect export taxes from fellow Jews. Naturally these Jews were considered traitors. Many of them were also extortionists. So in the New Testament tax collector and sinner are frequently mentioned in the same breath. Complaining one day about cantankerous people, Jesus said, “John the Baptist comes fasting and drinking no wine, and everyone says, `He has a demon in him!’ Then I, the Son of Man, come eating and drinking, and everyone says, `Look at this man, will you! He is a glutton and wine-drinker, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’” (Mt 11:18-19) On another occasion Jesus berated the chief priests and Jewish elders saying, “I tell you that tax collectors and sinners (prostitutes included) are entering the kingdom of God ahead of you people. John the Baptist came preaching and they listened to him, but you fellows did not.” (Mt 21:32)
When Jesus heard the Pharisees were complaining that He ate with tax collectors and sinners, He told them, “Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do. Go and learn the meaning of the prophet Hosea’s words, `It is not your animal sacrifices and gifts that I want from you people. What I want from you is mercy and compassion.’” Then He added, “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mt 9:11; Hosea 6:6)
Jesus quotes Hosea again
That quote from Hosea must have been a favorite of Jesus; he used it on another occasion. One Sabbath the apostles were on their way to the synagogue. They had not eaten breakfast and were hungry. As they passed by a field of ripened wheat, they began to pick the grain and eat it. That was a violation of Jewish laws concerning food preparation on the Sabbath. The Pharisees complained to Jesus saying, “How come your disciples do what it is forbidden to do on the Sabbath!” Jesus responded, “Have you not read what David did when he and his men were hungry? How he and his men went into the house of God and ate the bread which only priests were allowed to eat.” (I Sam 21:6; Lv 24:5-9) To the Pharisees He quoted the same passage from Hosea, saying, “Go and learn the meaning of the prophet’s word, ‘It is not your animal sacrifices and gifts that I want from you people. What I want from you is mercy and compassion.’” Then he added, “I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mt 12:1-8; Hosea 6:6)
Righteousness & Sinfulness
Some years ago, Anglican William Coats wrote an article in an Anglican diocesan newspaper about the event which sent the Archbishop of Milwaukee into fast retirement amid a cloud of sexual scandal. In the article Coats claimed that we Roman Catholics have it all wrong when it comes to righteousness and sinfulness. He characterized his article as “incendiary” and said to a Roman Catholic friend, “It is a bit anti-Roman Catholic, but you will have to live with that.”
Coats maintained that if the Roman Church had had in place a right theology and spirituality about righteousness and sinfulness it could have spared much spiritual anguish for the church of the Milwaukee Archdiocese and its faithful, when the sexual scandal broke into the news media. In his article he referred to a homily preached by a priest in the cathedral. The homily, Coats said, pretended to “comfort” the faithful. It condemned the Archbishop’s sexual affair and the hush money involved, and it asked for mercy and forgiveness upon the Archbishop who, the homilist said, “had fallen from grace.”
“The fall from grace”
In exasperation Coats exclaimed, “This is far too much for me to take!” He explained his exasperation by claiming that there is a strain in Roman Catholic theology which sees human beings as born good, but who “fall from grace” when they commit certain sins. That, he exclaimed, is so much nonsense! The Archbishop, he said, did not fall from some goodness. He started out from where we all start out -- from a human mixture of good and evil. Then he quoted the words of the Apostle Paul, “I tell you, not one of us is righteous; no, not one…. We have all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. “ (Rm 3: 11, 23)
That quote, Coats maintained, does not refer to a moment of sexual weakness which then means disgrace. Rather, it refers to the daily lot of us all. We all know our failures. We all know what we could have done but did not do. We all know what we have done badly. We all know the deceit that is in us. We all know our own cover-up jobs. The idea that one sexual sin somehow besmirches a clean record is pure nonsense, he wrote. The Archbishop and all of us besmirch our records everyday in big and small ways, in ways sometimes hidden and sometimes exposed.
In the article Anglican Coats maintained that had this kind of theology and spirituality been alive and well in the Archdiocese of Milwaukee when scandal broke upon it, there would not have been so much self-righteousness in some, or so much need for cover-up in others, or so much anguish in the hearts of many faithful. He wrapped up his article very neatly and niftily with one shining line: We humans do not fall from grace; we fall into grace.
The fall into grace!
After the Parable of the Good Samaritan, the Parable of the Prodigal Son ranks next in my book. What Jesus said of the two greatest commandments can be said of these two great parables, "On these two depend the whole Law and the Prophets." (Mt 22:40)
The Prodigal Son is a disobedient young man who wonders off into a foreign land where he squanders his inheritance on parties and prostitutes. With time, however, he is reduced to slopping the pigs for a gentile farmer. He decides then to turn his life around and make his way back to his father’s house. The father is an incredibly loving man who for months and years looks off to the horizon for any sign of his son returning. When finally one day he spies his son still a long way off, he runs out to meet him. At that moment, the son falls into grace! He falls into the open arms of his father. The father wraps his son’s bare body in a rich robe. He places a ruby ring on his finger and soft sandals on his calloused feet. Then he orders the fatted calf to be slaughtered for a banquet to celebrate a son who was lost but now has been found. (Lk 15:1-32)
The parable has sometimes been called also the Parable of the Prodigal Father. It can also be called the Parable of Man’s Fall into Grace.
Conclusion
Our fall into Amazing Grace
Anglican Coats takes a parting slam at the Roman Church saying, “The Roman Catholic Church certainly has a right to preach and practice whatever theology it wants to, but as the dominant religion in this country it often gives the impression that its view is the Christian point of view. As a child of the Reformation and as an Anglican I say, No, it is not!”
Man’s fall into grace is so wonderful that the Reformation sang of it with all its might in its hymn of hymns -- Amazing Grace.
“Amazing Grace, how sweet the soundthat saved a wretch like me.I once was lost but now am found,was blind but now I see.”
This parable of Man’s Fall into Grace is read on the 24th Sunday of Ordinary Time in liturgical Cycle C. After that, this magnificent gem falls silent for two whole years! It is not proclaimed in Cycle A or B. Imagine, the Sunday assembly is deprived of hearing such good news about our sinful selves for two whole years! And when, at last, this great parable is finally proclaimed in Cycle C, there are brackets in the missalette indicating a shortened reading of the parable! Imagine, wanting to shorten such a gem! Tell whoever proclaims the gospel that day to forget about the brackets. Tell him that we sinners have all the time in the world to listen to such good news about our fall into Amazing Grace.
[1]] By the “the unchurched” is especially meant not those who have left the church but those whom the church has left!
[2] Acts of the Apostles 17:24
