Fr. Roger J. Landry
Conversations with Consequences Podcast
Homily for the 31st Sunday in Ordinary Time (C), Vigil
November 2, 2019
To listen to an audio recording of this short Sunday homily, please click below:
The following text guided the homily:
- This is Fr. Roger Landry and it’s a joy to have a chance to ponder with you the consequential conversation Jesus wants to have with us this Sunday.
- Last week, you remember, Jesus presented us the parable contrasting the prayer of the Pharisee and the Publican. Both went up to the temple to pray. Both left. And only one’s prayer was heard. The one who left justified was notthe outwardly devout Pharisee who fasted twice a week, gave ten percent of his income back to God, and rejoiced that he was not a thief, rogue, adulterer or tax collector. The one who left with a right relationship toward God was a humble tax collector, who stood at the back, beat his breast and begged, “God, be merciful to me a sinner!” In today’s Gospel, we encounter those characters from the parable — self-righteous “good people” who complain that Jesus actually interacts with sinners and a notorious, humble “tax collector” — in real life. And we see how the God-man responds when such a sinner calls out to him for such mercy.
- Jesus called himself the “Good Shepherd” and said that he would leave the ninety-nine to go in search of one sheep who was lost (John 10:11; Lk 15:4). Before that Good Shepherd headed up to Jerusalem to lay down his life for his sheep (John 10:15), he first wanted to hunt down one who was lost. He went to literally the nethermost place on earth in search of perhaps the greatest public sinner of that city, to bring him back to his fold. He went to Jericho, the lowest city on the planet — 853 feet below sea level — to find Zacchaeus, who was not just one of a bunch of despised and excommunicated tax-collectors loathsome to the Jewish authorities, but the chief tax collector of the whole region. Jesus left the crowds behind and entered alone with the tax collector into his home and into his life. He called Zacchaeus, his lost sheep, by name (Is 43:1; John 10:3). The very name Zacchaeus means “God remembers,” and God had never forgotten him. Heaven rejoiced on that day more for his return than for those who had never wandered (Lk 15:7). So, too, Jesus takes the initiative of knocking at the door of our souls, asking for entry, coming to us wherever we are, no matter the depths to which we’ve sunk, no matter the fact that perhaps everyone else around us might despise us. To the extent that we repent of whatever sins we’ve committed and accept Jesus’ gracious invitation by “welcoming him with delight,” we, too, like Zacchaeus, can have salvation come to us.
- This is the first of three lessons we learn from the story of Zacchaeus and Jesus, that Jesus wants to take us apart from the crowd and bring us the salvation of his mercy. The place where Jesus ordinarily does this is where Saint Pope John Paul II used to say Jesus and the whole Church exist solely for each of us alone — the confessional. In the Sacrament of Confession, Jesus ministers to us individually, just as he interacted individually with Zacchaeus. But like Zacchaeus, we need to come down, to leave the perches of our pride and allow Jesus to go to work through his priestly ministers.
- The second thing we learn from this encounter of Zacchaeus and Jesus is about the diminutive tax collector’s hunger to see Jesus. Zacchaeus’ climbing of the sycamore tree is more than an interesting detail. The text tells us that he was trying to see Jesus, but couldn’t because of the crowd, so he ran ahead and climbed a tree along Jesus’ route in order to be able to see him. We, too, are often blocked from seeing the Lord because other people get in the way. They block our sight in many ways. Parents block the sight of their children when they don’t pray with them or take them to Mass. Cultural forces, like those in the entertainment industry or in public schools or institutions of higher learning, impede our vision by distorting Jesus’ image, ignoring him altogether, or ridiculing those who believe in him. Sometimes even those who should be icons of Jesus — priests, religious, catechists, godparents — obscure our vision because rather than reflecting the image of Jesus to us through virtue they obstruct it through un-Christian behavior. Zacchaeus’ example challenges each of us to consider what is the extent to which we go, what trees or obstacles we’ll mount, in order to see Jesus more clearly.
- The third thing this episode with Zacchaeus teaches us is that a true conversion to God also brings about a real conversion to others. Even though he, like his fellow tax-collectors, would have been guilty of ripping off the people of Jericho by basically shaking them down for unjust commissions beyond what the tax collectors needed to send to Rome, Zacchaeus knew that he needed to make amends and from that point forward to use the gift of his office to do good rather than evil. So he told Jesus, “Look, half of my possessions, Lord, I will give to the poor; and if I have defrauded anyone of anything, I will pay back four times as much.” Strict justice would have required his giving back precisely what he had overcharged. If he had really wanted to be kind, he would have given it back with modest interest. But he was going to give it back with 400 percent interest, which was a sign of great contrition for the gravity of his previous sins of stealing and intimidation. Similarly, we’re called to examine our consciences and to make amends with those we’ve injured through our sins. To apologize. To repair the harm we’ve caused through gossip. To make restitution for the things we’ve stolen from family members, from work, from strangers, from the poor through our selfishness. And to do so extravagantly.
- At Mass on Sunday, we’ll see just how extravagant Jesus can be. When we and the whole human race were incapable of seeing Him on account of the great weight of sin which was reducing our humanity to smaller and smaller images of what we are called to be, and thereby when we were incapable of climbing any tree at all, he, out of his great love for us, climbed one on our own behalf, so that each of us might still be able to see him, perched upon his glorious wooden throne. He who comes to seek and save what was lost will call each of us by name and say, “I must stay in your house today.” He will invite us to be lifted up by him onto life-giving crucifiorm tree, so that as God’s children we might spend eternity in that celestial tree house built upon the Cross’ firm foundation.
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