Scripture Reflections for the Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

“trust me, everybody, when I tell you the spiritual life is always a fight. Not sometimes, not usually. Always a fight. Why? Because you're walking the path of Christ and that is always a path that stands athwart the path of the world.”

“Friends, sometimes as we compete, pouring out our lives, running the race, we can feel pretty alone. Sometimes we receive little or no support from our fellow human beings. But God stands by us.”

“Have you kept the faith? Have you kept your eyes fixed on Jesus Christ? Have you grown in your trust and love of him?”

“In these hard times we are in, which are likely to get harder, there will be a great need for acts of mercy and kindness. We can rise to this, because Christ has given us mercy. He has poured out His life in giving us life.”

“I would venture to guess that 98% of us hearing that story spontaneously nurse this feeling: “Thank God, I’m not like that Pharisee!” And, in doing that, we are him! Exactly like him, we’re brimming over with our own sense of virtue and, because of that, begin judging others.”

“Jesus does not say that the Tax-collector is a virtuous man. Jesus does not say that the tax collector is not a hypocrite in his own way. What is good about the tax collector, according to Jesus, is that he admits his faults and his hypocrisy, he is humble, and asks God for mercy.”

“Virtue is indeed its own reward, and that’s good. However, feeling righteous can soon enough turn into feeling self-righteous. Nothing feels better than virtue; but self-righteousness feels pretty good too.”

“what if rather than justifying our own significance, we simply look at our own insignificance in life, how small we truly are? What would this world be like?”

“As we mature morally and religiously it becomes almost impossible not to compare ourselves with others who are struggling and to not feel both a certain smugness, that we are not like them, and a certain disdain for their condition”

“It is not sufficient, like the Pharisee, just to ‘accommodate’ God by turning up at the church, or synagogue or temple, fulfilling the ritual, outwardly performing the prayers, but inwardly lacking the faith and simplicity of the child”

“We are to enter and dwell in Christ by what we are not. Admitting what we are not is the key to his mercy. Not our successes and triumphs, but our failures and our faults are where he finds us, and carries us home on his shoulders. The publican knew this.”

“we hope that when someone hears us pray, they will not exclaim that what we are saying is just ‘a set of words’”

“Jesus cautioned against contempt, against thinking ourselves better than others. He had many things in mind, mind you, when he said that, but I suspect he was also cautioning us about how we feel about ourselves when we look at what is happening at St. Elmer’s parish just down the road from us.”

“It is when we can stand before God and others as the publican did and say in the face of our betrayals, “These things are wrong. I shouldn’t be doing this, but I can’t help myself,” that we can receive the forgiveness that washes us clean.”

“it is the sin of lying to oneself until one becomes so warped that one believes one’s own lie. Falsehood becomes truth. The reason this sin cannot be forgiven is not that God does not want to forgive it, but rather that the person no longer sees the need for forgiveness.”

“The tax collector knows what he is but he also knows what God is, who God is. The tax collector's prayer is to the God who gives justice to his chosen ones.”

“how often have we used the Law, and again be honest, to attack someone else? Have we wielded the Law as a weapon? Turn the question around, how often have we used the Law to accuse ourselves?”

“If you're alienated from God you will be ipso facto alienated from all of God's creatures. Therefore, we need to be tied back, religare, tied back to God but how often the very practices and beliefs that are designed to foster connection actually end up fostering division.”

“Christians, let's be honest, most of the time we relate to each other in a selfish way. That means I'm kind to you or I listen to you or I'm good to you because somehow I'll get something out of it. I'm loving you for my own sake. That isn't love.”

“I began the ritual for praying with the dying and along with some family members, I led them in prayer. As I went through the prayers, I realized I was moving from saying the prayers to being in prayer with the woman and her family. What a difference it made in me.”

“Jesus’ point is that pride can overshadow all other sins, and that if we have attained all other human virtues but retained pride in ourselves, we are like someone who has not even begun the spiritual life”

“Paul may have demonstrated that he “was not like the rest of humanity,” because he forgave, but there was no pride in himself—only gratitude to Jesus who stood with him in solidarity”

“he got what he asked for which is nothing: nothing because he had no need of God. He relied heavily on his personal effort, thereby forgetting that it is only God who can make one holy and not just ones good deeds.”

“Our faith and prayer need to become the springboard for us to grow in intimacy with God and sensitivity towards others, specially the poor and those in need. Praying should help us to become better human beings seeking what is just and good in our daily life.”

“The difficult challenge is to recognize both our good works, our strengths, and our moral failings. In refusing to admit what virtues he lacked, what sins he had committed, the Pharisee failed to ask for God’s further transforming graces.”