.. 5th. SUNDAY OF LENT (C)
(Isaiah 43:16-21; Philippians 3:8-14;
John: 8:1-11)
Today’s
Gospel about the woman taken in the very act of adultery was much loved and
worshipfully understood by Mother Church from the beginning, and in the course of
her development of our Catholic liturgy she decided to ‘assign’ two other
readings to support, strengthen, or broaden our understanding and appreciation
of the Gospel passage. Today, the jewel of divine wisdom contained in our
Gospel is most admirably displayed in the fulness of its liturgical setting for
today’s Eucharistic celebration.
Our
first reading emphasized the very essence of our human nature and the ultimate
purpose for its creation. Mankind, having been originally created in the
likeness of God, His very own Chosen People were formed for God that they might
announce His praise:
My Chosen People, whom I formed for Myself, that they might
announce My praise.
And
to prepare, help, and guide His Chosen People for the fulfilling of that duty
of praise, God gave them -- through Moses -- the Law; and then, His chosen
prophets -- ‘ad hoc’ interpreters of the Law of Moses over the ages -- to
perfect and prepare God’s Chosen People that they might recognize the sovereignty
of Jesus’ Person when He came and appreciate His fulfilment of that original Law.
In
accordance with the great prophet Isaiah’s appreciation of the wonder and the goodness
of God we heard him, in our second reading, declare in God’s name:
Remember not the events of the past, the things of long ago
consider not; see, I am DOING SOMETHING NEW.
And
this gradually developing newness in God’s providence for His Chosen People
came to its glorious climax when the Law was ultimately superseded by the GOOD
NEWS of Jesus, our Lord and Saviour.
Now,
in Mother Church’s proclamation of that Good News, St. Paul was our Risen Lord’s
own Personal choice as teacher of the nations, and he testified most eloquently
in our second reading concerning the newness of God’s Providence for us:
I even consider everything as a loss because of the supreme good
of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have accepted the loss of all
things and I consider them so much rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found
in Him, not having any righteousness of my own based on the law but that which
comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God, depending on faith
to know Him and the power of His resurrection and (the) sharing of His
sufferings by being conformed to His death, if somehow I may attain the
resurrection from the dead.
Surely,
dear People of God, those words resound in our minds and stir our hearts, who
have ourselves learned -- through the gift of Faith -- something of the truth
and beauty of God’s great goodness and majesty, and have experienced something
of the loving proximity of the glorious Jesus Himself in the Holy Eucharist. The Scriptures and the Holy Eucharist are truly
sublime blessings, thanks to Jesus’ Gift of His most Holy Spirit, abiding with
Mother Church and sacramentally bestowed on her faithful children. St.
Paul assures us (1 Corinthians 10:13) that that resonance with Jesus for the glory
of God can thrill and fulfil our whole being, and is a privilege to be
treasured with firm confidence and sure hope despite all the world’s trials and
opposition, because:
God is faithful and will not let you be tried beyond your strength
but with the trial will also provide a way out, so that you may be able to bear
it.
However,
in that context of the fullness of today’s liturgy there came, in our Gospel
reading, an anti-climax so tragically characteristic of mankind’s response to
God today. The Scribes and Pharisees – having appropriated the seat of
Moses for themselves (Matthew 23:2) – planned to destroy both the Mission and
the very Person of Jesus by taking advantage of human persistence in and
affection for sin:
Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing
adultery. Now the Law of Moses commanded us to stone such women.
So, what do You say?
Their
secret thoughts and deepest plans they did not dare mention, for they were
poisoned by bitter pride, and instead of humbly seeking to understand God’s
truth for God’s Chosen People, they were using devilish cunning to further
their own presumptive authority: ‘The people expect us, and You most
especially, to uphold our Jewish Law, but the Romans – our oppressors -- will
not allow us to put anyone to death. What do You say?’
What
a scenario!! The religious leaders try to use God’s Law against God’s
Son; they try to turn the people against Jesus their Saviour and thwart His
redeeming mission and also to provoke the Roman authorities against His regal
Person!
It
is our Gospel reading that finally makes crystal clear the seriousness and
depth of the issues involved in the apparently every-day issue of human
infidelity:
Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on
do not sin anymore.”
Those
words of Jesus show us that although the time for the condemnation of sinners
is not yet, nevertheless, such sexual infidelity was in no way trivial.
Let
us now therefore, dear People of God, turn our attention to Jesus’ very self,
in His human attitude, to both His ‘professional antagonists’ -- the Scribes
and Pharisees -- and so many of His thoughtless pseudo-supporters, so easily
yielding themselves to pleasure like the woman in the Gospel story, and ever
comforting themselves with words such as, ‘it doesn’t really matter’; and we
find yet again Divine Love’s wisdom and patience most beautifully Personified.
Jesus
does not argue with the Pharisees and Scribes, He respects what measure of love
for the Law of God might possibly be behind their exposure of such immorality;
He even seems to go just a very few steps along the way with them:
Let one among you be the
first to throw a stone at her, IF HE IS WITHOUT SIN.
And
thus, His opponents are enabled to reluctantly withdraw, slink away, from the
scene with a certain measure of humility-for-public-appreciation. What a
wonderfully wise and divinely simple discomfiture!!
He
then turns to the woman.
Notice
there are no emotional words; no modern gestures (comforting arms round shoulders)
of humanistic sympathy in order to make manifest the speaker’s own
understanding and caring attitude. For Jesus, sin is sin, ever
real and hateful in whatever circumstances; the sinner, however, is not yet bound
hard and fast, and salvation can still be hers, true joy can still fill her
heart and mind with peace, if she will turn her face from the easy and
pleasurable way and begin to look for God:
Woman, has no one condemned you? Neither do I condemn
you. Go, and from now on do not sin any more.
Dear
People of God, so many knowingly allow themselves to foolishly listen to the
Liar, the Persuader, and weakly follow his suggestion, ‘it doesn’t really
matter’.
Today,
one third of young people do not know their own sexuality we are told, because
too many young people with no principles follow bad examples for reasons as
puerile as popularity and immediate personal pleasure: trying this sexuality on
for so long, so to speak, and then another sexual attitude for another time:
dabbling with what God made seriously beautiful and thus befuddling themselves
concerning what was created to be fulfilling and has now become for them a
meaningless puzzle and source of bitterness and pain. In that so modern
setting, devotion has to face up and respond to not only to thoughtless
disregard and disdain for religious observance and love of God, but also to the
more diabolical opposition of professional and powerful pride, big-time money
and the large-scale promotion of pleasure and excitement.
And,
though this world of pleasure, power, excitement and greed allows itself to
ignore and even ridicule the name and teaching of Jesus, nevertheless His words
are eternal and true, offering life or pronouncing judgement:
If I had not come and spoken to them they would not have sin; but
as it is, they have seen and hated both Me and My Father.
