Luke 18:9-14
In the Gospel of Luke we have many more parables than do the other gospels. Luke seems to have gone out of his way to collect them. Luke probably never met Jesus; he was a gentile who became a disciple of Paul and thus learned about Christianity. And remember, Paul probably never met Jesus in the flesh either. I mention this because one of the things Luke does when he records a parable of Jesus is he tells us why Jesus told the parable. And if you know what I just told you, you might ask, “How did Luke know why Jesus told the parable?” Most of the time it isn’t a big deal for Luke to give his opinion because many of the parables are pretty obvious. But sometimes hearing Luke tell us why Jesus told the parable prejudices us to accept his interpretation and ignore what else might be going on here.
Do you have a little sympathy for the Pharisee in today’s story? I think you should. He’s thanking God that he isn’t like the rest of men; in a way he’s thanking God that he is privileged, that he can afford to tithe everything, that he can fast twice a week when Pharisees generally fasted once a week, and you had to be rich to fast because poor people ate whenever they could find food. You and I, just by being citizens of this country, are better off than most human beings; just by being able to come to Church, we’re better off than a lot of people who for physical or political reasons, can’t. And just by being Catholic we are better off than so many people who don’t have access to the teachings of Jesus and the church Jesus founded. If you aren’t thanking God for these things, you should -- several times a day, several times a week.
It’s not charitable, I guess, for the Pharisee to point out that unlike the rest of men he’s not greedy, dishonest or adulterous, or even like this tax collector over here who works for the Roman occupiers and is therefore a traitor. And the Pharisee is thanking God that he’s not like that either. Are you thankful that you are not greedy or dishonest or adulterous or a traitor to your church or your country? I’m thankful that God has kept me out of trouble.
We are drawn to the humility of the Tax collector, who stands off beating his breast and repeating the words “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” and that’s something every one of us could say in all honesty, even if we’ve just gotten out of making a good confession. Saint Paul speaks for all of us when he says, “I know that good does not dwell in me …For I do not do the good I want, but I do the evil I do not want…when I want to do right, I discover that evil is at hand… Miserable one that I am, who will deliver me from this mortal body?
Jesus of course tells us, or maybe Luke is telling us, that the tax collector went home justified, nor the Pharisee. And there is really only one thing I can think of that really differentiates the two of them; the Pharisee lacks humility. Even though he is appropriately thanking God for all his blessings, in a way he is attributing his good fortune to himself. He is pleased that he’s taken the right path, that he’s made the right choices in life.
When I was in high school one of my classmates was always going around telling people how humble he was -- not in so many words, but by his behavior. He had a terrible image of himself, or at least that’s how it came across. He would say “I’m too stupid to go to college” and “I can’t go out for a team sport because I’m so clumsy” or “I won’t ask a girl on a date because I know she’d turn me down”. He lived a life of very low expectations. I don’t think that’s what humility is all about.
Saint Thomas Aquinas, my go to saint for difficult questions, says that humility is a virtue that recognizes one’s own limitations and the gifts received from God. It does not involve self-deprecation, but rather an honest acknowledgement of one’s abilities as gifts from God meant to be used for his glory, rather than personal satisfaction. And it is crucial to spiritual growth and the proper relationship to God, because only in this relationship can we submit to divine authority, which is a necessary condition to receive God’s grace and achieve true wisdom. And it is seen most clearly in Mary, our mother and Jesus' mother. After being informed that her life would be totally given over to God’s purpose, she replied, “Then do it to me like you said!”. And her acceptance of God’s will changed history. And she went on to say, “My being is like a mirror that reflects God”. (or words to that effect, I’m translating from the Greek). Mary, the perfect human being, recognized that in complete submission to God, she would be exalted.
Isn’t it amazing to think that the universe is four and one half billion years old, that traveling at light speed it would take 16 000 years to reach the most distant visible star; that human beings have been around for about 300,000 years? We are practically nothing, we individual humans. But isn’t it amazing to think that Jesus would have died for you if you were the only human being who ever existed, that’s how important you are to God. Maybe if we meditate on these two facts, we will find true humility.
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