The one to whom little is forgiven, loves little!

Homily
11th Sunday in Ordinary Time C
St. Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas
15 June 2013
Year of Faith
Daily Readings


Audio

Complacency.  The first reading from 2nd Samuel about David being exposed by the prophet Nathan is a great lesson in complacency.  It is almost unbelievable after the career David had, first defeating Goliath and then Saul and then every other enemy of Israel, all the time trusting deeply in the Lord who called him and was with him at every moment, that David was capable of the awful sin that the prophet Nathan has found out.  David's infidelity with Bathsheba was one thing, but his sending of her husband Uriah to the front lines of battle to be killed was unthinkable for a man like David who was once so close to the Lord and so in love with the Lord.  Yet we find in this story the reality that the battle against sin in our lives is never complete.  It is a battle that goes on and on and on, requiring great effort and determination at every turn of our lives.  For we are capable of anything - good and bad - at every moment of our lives.  We all have habits, good and bad, but our freedom is so great the past does not predict the future.  We find David in this part of his life pretending to be better than he is.  He is king.  He is taking long naps in the afternoon while his soldiers are on the front lines in the campaign season.  David has stopped doing battle.  He is self-satisfied.  He is disengaged.  He is isolated.  He is complacent.  What is more, he has lost his dependence upon God.  These are recipes for disaster.

We learn in the other readings from this weekend however that there are worse things than being a sinner. David repents, as we all have to repent.  Sinners we all are.  It does little good to measure who is the greater sinner, and who is the least. This was the job of the Pharisees - to judge who was following the law.  They were experts at judging things from the outside in - they thought their job was to measure and to rank the goodness of people according to the law of Moses.  Yet as St. Paul says clearly in the letter to the Galatians, such measurement is rubbish.  It amounts to nothing.  For the law exists for the sake of relationship, to the sake of enhancing relationship and of increasing love.  The law does not determine who is worthy of love - it is there to teach people how to love.  Thus as St. Paul says, if the law does not enhance our relationship with Jesus, and make us more dependent upon him, and allow him to be with us and to do more with us, in us and through us, then the law is rubbish.


The Pharisees, as we have come to know well, get this important point backward.  In judging and measuring they are actually decreasing dependence upon relationship and increasing dependence on the law - the exact opposite of what is intended.  As a result, we find the Pharisees to be pathetic people - always having to pretend to be good from the outside in rather than from the inside out - always having to be fake and pretend to be better than they really are.  As a result the Pharisees are incapable of authentic love which must be vulnerable and dependent and honest.

Jesus points us to the sinful woman as an example of someone who has learned to love authentically.  Yes, she has learned the hard way.   But it is better than not learning at all.  As I said earlier, the worst thing in life is not being a sinner - the worst thing is being someone who has no need for love, and who has given up on love.  The sinful woman shows that she realizes she is loved from the inside out, beginning from her weakest point, where nobody else loves her, and where she cannot love herself.  She is loved there uniquely and powerfully by Jesus, and she shows that she knows who he is by her effusive tears and expensive perfume.    The Pharisees want Jesus to play their game of judging and measuring - they have no interest in being loved or forgiven by him, and this shows in the way they treat him.  So Jesus says to them what we all need to hear - the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.  (Lk 7:47).