A Reflection for Friday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Find today’s readings here.
I desire mercy, not sacrifice. (Mt 9:13)
Calling Matthew to follow him, to join the fellowship of his disciples, Jesus made a bold move for his times. Matthew was perceived as a woeful choice, a loathsome tax collector, among the more odious functionaries of the era. Jesus is quickly admonished by Pharisees for dirtying himself by associating with the likes of Matthew and other sinners—even sitting down among them and sharing a meal.
“Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do,” he volleys in kind: “I did not come to call the righteous but sinners.”
But it is the interstitial sentences that stand out to me today: “Go and learn the meaning of the words, I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”
Jesus is quoting Hosea: “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”
God is ready even before acts of atonement to show mercy, indeed he longs for it.
Let the mercy we show in life begin with a little tongue-holding and with a proper humility, a ruthless awareness of our own faults and sins and imperfections.
Jesus calls for mercy so many times in scripture, it’s almost as if he anticipates how hard it will be for the folks who will one day call themselves Christians to live out the demands of mercy in everyday personal and communal life.
How we wallow in scrupulosity and scolding, nurture grievances and resentment, create distances between our brothers and sisters. So many planks, unremoved from so many eyes, so many who somehow free themselves to finger-point, deplore and condemn others.
Can you disagree or find fault with a brother or sister and still hold them in mercy and love? Can you engage over difficult discourses but keep mere kindness and human dignity at the forefront? Of course you can; in fact, our faith demands it.
Lead with mercy, and you will never go far wrong. But may our mercy not be served up in self-deception, a disguise for the wrath, resentment or pettiness that might undercurrent our interventions. Let the mercy we show in life begin with a little tongue-holding and with a proper humility, a ruthless awareness of our own faults and sins and imperfections.
And let’s remember to be merciful to ourselves for those failures as well.
