Homily: Monday 5th Week of Lent

Once again, a recorded video of this homily for Monday, March 30 -- indeed of the entire Mass -- can be found on our parish website.

https://sumtercatholic.org/homilies/

These video recordings will continue as we cope with the requirements mandated by the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The text of my homily follows:
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Readings:  Dan 13:41c-62; Ps 23; Jn 8:1-11

Have you ever done something, that looking back on it, you realize was unjust? I think of my own past – and the present too -- lack of charity, selfishness, displaced anger… I wish I had a more selective memory because the sins of the past can overwhelm us if we let them.

On a retreat some years ago I spent time with the retreat master, a Benedictine monk. He knew I had past issues to discuss, so he simply said, “Let’s make this a confession where you just go through your life and air all those ancient things that trouble you.” I suppose we spoke for an hour or more.

After giving me absolution, he said, “All those failings, all those sins are gone. God not only forgives them, He forgets them. 

“He wants you to be God-like and forget them too. They’re gone. Stop dwelling on them. But don’t forget your story, how God has moved you closer to the person He calls you to be.”

As I rose to leave, he added, “You know all those people who’ve hurt you? Many of them experience the same regrets. But even if they don’t, you must forgive them as well.”

Yes, a most liberating experience, one of reconciliation and conversion.

This is nothing new. God has called us to conversion from the start, from Eden to the Incarnation and beyond. In our reading, we see Susanna falsely accused by…well, by two dirty old men. But the prophet Daniel came to her defense, proving the false witness of the accusers. As a result, they suffered the sentence they tried to inflict on the innocent Susanna.

Susanna ands the Two Elders

Of course, as Christians we might object that they, too, should be forgiven. But remember, God was leading His chosen people, step by painful step, from darkness to the fulness of Truth revealed by Jesus Christ. Jesus will fulfill the Law, revealing the depth of divine love that motivates it, and teaching them and us to live it in its fulness; for God desires our conversion, not our punishment. 

How did He express it to Ezekiel? Listen again to the words of our Gospel acclamation.

“I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but rather that they turn from their ways and live…” [Ez 33:11]

God told His chosen ones it was their sins, their stubbornness and disobedience, that would send them into exile. But still He remains with them, and speaking through His prophet Isaiah, led them to what shall be:

“Remember not the events of the past, the things of long ago consider not; see, I am doing something new!” [Is 43:18-19]

God wanted them to trust Him, to look forward not backward, to put their sins, their idolatry behind them and to serve the Living God. They remain His Chosen People, for through them He would bring salvation to the world.

St. Paul, too, reminded of his own past sins, calls us to repentance and conversion: 

“One thing I do: forgetting what lies behind but straining forward to what lies ahead, I continue my pursuit toward the goal, the prize of God’s upward calling, in Christ Jesus. [Phil 3:13-14]

Yes, Paul tried to forget his sins, while remembering all that God had done for him through the gift of faith. For Paul to forget his story would be to forget his God.

The same is true of the woman caught in adultery. For her, for all of us, the danger lay in living in the past, wallowing in our guilt, unsure of forgiveness, unable even to forgive ourselves. But then she encountered Jesus.

“Has no one condemned you?”…Neither do I condemn you.” [Jn 8:10-11]

Her sin was forgiven, and that forgiveness became a part of her life, her story. Like Paul, she would not forget her story, and neither should we. Because her story is your story and my story. Indeed, she’s really all of us, everyone from Adam until judgment day, all of us in need of a Savior, in need of forgiveness.

"Has no one condemned you?"

Hers is the story of salvation, of sin and mercy, of sin committed and sin forgiven. With forgiveness she’s called to begin a new life: “Go and sin no more,” Jesus tells her and us. Know and love the God who refuses to condemn. Learn to accept His forgiveness.

So many don’t, but go through life, wallowing in guilt, afraid of hell, tormented by their pasts, unable to make peace with their brokenness and human frailty.

This isn’t why God became man. This isn’t why He died that horrible death on that dark Friday afternoon.

The current crisis can tempt us to look back to happier, more stable times; but as Christians we are called to confront the present and look to the future.

We see a building with locked doors and can fall prey to the temptations of the evil one: “Where is my Church? Where is my God?”

Brothers and sisters, God’s Church is not a building. It is His community of salvation. It is you and I, joined together with all members of the living Body of Christ. It is the universal Church, intimately united in the Communion of Saints.

God acts in His Church always, even when the doors of the buildings are locked; for God acts in and through His People, wherever they are.

For the true disciple of Jesus Christ, tomorrow is always better than yesterday. Each day is a new creation in the presence of a loving God.

Confront today’s crisis with faith and prudence but look forward to the hope of tomorrow.

Pray, then, for tomorrow’s hope and for those working tirelessly, with God’s help, to bring it about. Pray too for a rebirth of self-giving, a new birth of love.

Only two weeks of Lent remain. As we all hope to rise with Christ, let us repeat the song He sings to us:

“Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth” [Is 42:19].

Come to think of it, as Christians, we are the new thing. Why not spring forth, filled with hope?