Introduction
“For love is strong as death; its jealousy lasting as the power of death. No flood can extinguish love nor river submerge it” (Song 8:6-7). With these famous images, the irresistible force of love is described in the Song of Songs. One always runs a big risk—we know it—who gets involved in an emotional bond: love presupposes freedom and entails the possibility of rejection and failure. They are part of the game even jealousy, torment, anxiety, fear of abandonment and all the emotions that we call heartbreak. “Love makes me sick”—repeats the bride of the Song of Songs (Song 2:5; 5:8).
God wanted to take this risk: he has agreed to be weak and put into account the possibility of defeat. We always imagined him all-powerful, but in love, this prerogative is excluded from the rules of the game. This term is never attributed to God in the Bible, and rightly so, because, since he created the universe with its own laws and has given life to a free man, he has somewhat restricted his power. It is what the rabbis called contraction, concealment, auto-limitation of God.
God cannot force; he must win the loved person over. If he’d play on the effect fear, or would threaten punishments, he would have lost the game; he would not create love, but hypocrisy.
In Jesus, God has experienced failure several times. Jerusalem has not corresponded to his love: “How often have I tried to bring together your children as a bird gathers her young under her wings, but you refused” (Lk 13:34). In Nazareth he could not perform any miracle (Mk 6:5-6); the rich young man responds with a refusal (Mt 19:16-22).
In Revelation, God is not called omnipotent, but pantokrator, which means One who has everything in his hand. Men are free to make their play, but in the challenge of love, it is God who runs the game, with unparalleled skill. It is hard to imagine that he lets it get out of hand.
Now we can understand the words of Jesus: “There will be more rejoicing in heaven over one repentant sinner than over ninety decent people, who do not need to repent” (Lk 15:7). The greatest joy of the lover is the reconquest of the beloved, and hearing her repeat: “I will go back to my husband for I was better off then than now!” (Hos 2:9).
To internalize the message, we repeat:
“We have known and believed in the love God has for us.”
First Reading: Exodus 32:7-11,13-14
In Egypt, since the time of the first dynasties (3000 B.C.), the bull was the image of the great god Ptah in Memphis, the creator god from whom the fertility of the fields and animals depended on. The fertilizing floods of the Nile were attributed to him.
Symbol of strength, the bull was often depicted in scenes of magical character. He was embalmed and mummified to immortalize the virtues. Many religious ceremonies were celebrated in his honor in the majestic temples. The Israelites had seen them; it fascinated them and perhaps they were even a little seduced.
After seeing so many miracles worked by the Lord during the exodus, they should have definitely left behind all the pagan practices. Instead, having just arrived in Sinai, while Moses was on the mountain to talk with the Lord, here they handed to Aaron, their jewelry and melt the gold to mold a bull (Ex 32:1-6).
The first part of the reading (vv. 7-10) describes the indignant reaction of God to such infidelity. The Lord said to Moses: “Now just leave me that my anger may blaze against them. I will destroy them but of you, I will make a great nation.” (v. 10).
Faced with such a proposal, many of us probably would have been happy to become fathers of a family of “righteous people.” Instinctively we separate our own responsibilities, notice one’s non-involvement in the facts, distinguished oneself from the guilty. But Moses does not flee, remains united to his people; he prefers to die with the brothers rather than save himself.
The second part of the reading (vv. 11-13) shows the prayer of Moses. In our text it is introduced thus: “And Moses besought the Lord his God, and said….” In fact, the expression used in the original Hebrew text should be translated as: “And Moses began to caress the face of the Lord, his God, saying….” Moses acts like a child and seeing his dad angry he begins to cuddle him until he manages to snatch a smile. The image of Moses who caresses the face of God is one of the most beautiful in the Bible.
Perhaps the scene surprises and disconcerts us because it presents a good Moses who speaks softly and God instead is angry and needs to regain his calm. Yet, with this image, taken from our human world, God shows that he wants us to pray to him with trust and confidence.
With what words does Moses caress the face of the Lord? What reasons would we have presented to God to get him to desist from his anger? Perhaps we would have said: “See, Lord, they have repented; they will not repeat the mistake ever again; the sin committed is not so serious….” All vain talk, because man—as we know—never ceases to be a sinner; he always repeats the same mistakes.
Moses is wiser: he understands that he could not rely on the good will of man and that the only way to salvation is to trust in the goodness of God. He begins by reminding the Lord of the unconditional promises he made to the patriarchs, and concludes: I do not want the Egyptians to say that you have not kept your word! This is the only real reason that allows hoping in the salvation of each person: the infinite love of God, love that will never be won by any unfaithfulness, however, great it may be.
The conclusion (v. 14): “The Lord changed his mind and would not yet harm his people.” What did the Israelites do to deserve God’s mercy? Nothing. They were silent. The Lord did everything by himself: he remembered that his promises are unconditional and he forgives his people.
If we were to confide in our strength, in our ability to perform virtuous acts, we would have every reason to despair. It is much safer to put our trust in God’s gratuitous love.
Second Reading: 1 Timothy 1:12-17
Do we have any evidence to say that God does not condemn anyone? Certainly.
Paul gives us an irrefutable proof in the passage of the First Letter to Timothy proposed to us today. He says: I had been a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a rabid enemy. There was no one worse than me. However, the Lord took mercy on me. Why did this happen? Because “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinner, of whom I am the first” (vv. 12-15).
Paul affirms that God used him as an example to show how great is his magnanimity (v. 16). If someone like him, an enemy of the faith, the chief of sinners, has received mercy, will someone be still afraid that God will treat him severely?
One might object: Paul was wrong—it’s true—but he was not so guilty because he did not realize he was doing evil (1 Tim 1:13); the people of Israel returned to pagan idolatry out of ignorance. The sheep—of which we will talk about in today’s Gospel—has been lost due to a mistake… for this the Lord was understanding.
Is it perhaps someone sins in a different way? Is there someone who, when he sins, really knows what he is doing? (cf. Lk 23:34).
Gospel: Luke 15:1-10
The so-called parables of mercy will be offered to us in this Sunday’s Gospel. The third, that of the prodigal son, was already commented on the fourth Sunday of Lent. Today we will just comment on the first two: that of the lost sheep and the lost coin. These two stories are apparently easy to interpret. Jesus seems to invite the disciples to go in search of sinners (thieves, corrupt, adulterous ones…) or to move them and entice them to return to the fold.
The main objective is entirely different. It is necessary to define who the recipients of the three parables are in order to capture the aim. The introductory verse leaves no doubt: Tax collectors and sinners were seeking Jesus eager to hear what he had to say. The Pharisees and the scribes frowned at this, muttering, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them. So Jesus told them this parable….” (vv. 1-3).
Those are not the disciples, nor the sinners, but the Pharisees and scribes, therefore, the righteous. Strange, but true: those who are called to conversion are not the sinners, but the righteous.
Let us try to understand the reason behind the complaints of the Pharisees and scribes. The rabbis recommended: “Man must not join the wicked, not even to get them to follow the law of God.” It was therefore prohibited to accept a dinner invitation with publicans and sinners. But Jesus did worse: he not only accepted the invitations of these disreputable people, but he welcomed them in his house (“receives sinners”).
The scribes and Pharisees would have nothing to say if he had invited the sinners who, after long fasting, prayer and penance would repent and make amends. They too travel by sea and land to win a single convert (Mt 23:15). What they did not understand was his behaving as a friend of sinners who remained as such (vv. 1-2). They accused him of organizing a feast for them. At some point, they require an explanation.
Each banquet reflects and, in some way, anticipates the great dinner that will be laden at the coming of the kingdom of God. In it, there will be no place for the wicked and the ungodly, but only for the righteous. Does Jesus not know this, pretending to ignore it, or worse, wanting to challenge the tradition of the rabbis?
The three parables are the answer, the self-defense of Jesus. He does not tell them to convince the sinners, but to help the righteous to review their ideas. In all three parables joy is spoken about (but not all share it) and a feast is organized (to which not everyone is willing to participate). Who is in and who is out?
Sinners are the lost coins and sheep, however—this is strange thing—now they are all around Jesus (we stress this all that appears in the first verse). They live in the house with him; they are having a feast; they participate in the banquet of the kingdom. The “righteous” instead are out and are likely to stay there if they do not change their way of thinking, if they do not realize what is happening, if they do not understand the newness that God is revealing. It is in this perspective that the three parables are read.
The lost sheep (vv. 4-7).
Since its inception, Israel has been a pastoral people. It is not surprising that the Bible speaks often of lambs, sheep, and goats (more than five times) and that many texts employ the pastoral language to describe the concern, tenderness, and the care of God for his people. Suffice to recall the famous Psalm: “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want” (Ps 23:1) or the moving scene of the exiles’ return from Babylon: “Like a shepherd he tends his flock: he gathers the lambs in his arms. He carries them in his bosom, gently leading those that are with young” (Is 40:11).
Jesus also often uses this image. Seeing the large crowd that followed him, he—says Mark—“had compassion on them for they were like sheep without a shepherd” (Mk 6:34). In today’s Gospel, he takes up the same picture and tells a parable that contains several illogical details.
The behavior of the shepherd is unrealistic: he forgets the ninety-nine sheep in the desert and runs from house to house, calls friends and neighbors, hosts a feast for a rather trivial incident. Then, we have an obvious disproportion between the part of the story concerning the discovery of the sheep and the one dedicated to the feast which occupies more than half of the parable.
These oddities direct us to the real meaning of the passage. The rabbis taught that the Lord is pleased with the resurrection of the righteous, and rejoice in the destruction of the wicked. Jesus reverses this official catechesis and announces what are the true feelings of God. He—he says—is pleased not with the destruction, but with the resurrection of the wicked: “There will be more rejoicing in heaven over one repentant sinner, than over ninety-nine decent people, who do not need conversion.” The Father “does not want even one of these little ones to be lost” (Mt 18:14) and organizes his feast for people who do not deserve it.
The doctrine of just retribution is a cornerstone of rabbinic theology. Jesus openly contradicts it showing that the tenderness and the kindness of God are not addressed to those who deserve them, but to those who need them.
For the Pharisees it is surprising that there is no reference to any reproach, to any punishment (some pastors broke a leg of the sheep that used to get away from the flock) and that any gesture of goodwill or of repentance by the sinner is not presupposed.
The recovery is all the work of God who wants only the good of those who did wrong. This is not intended as an invitation to become sinners to be loved by God, but to recognize themselves as such in front of him.
The “righteous,” in addition to putting their lives in order (because all are sinners and it is always difficult to define who is more and who is less), they must correct especially their theological ideas about God. The criticisms they addressed to Jesus, the rules of separation they impose, are the result of the false image of God they have in mind. It is a dangerous image because it prevents participation in the feast. The ninety-nine sheep remain in the desert and only the stray gets home because it lets itself be carried by the shepherd. It is especially dangerous because it is at the origin of fanaticism, intolerance, rigorism and alienation from God. To help the sinner to let oneself be found, it is a must to tell him—as Jesus does—the truth about God.
Make him know that God is not a judge to be afraid of, but a friend who loves always and in any way and experiences his greatest joy when he can embrace, when he sees free and happy one who is plunged into an abyss of death.
The lost coin (vv. 8-10).
The rabbis used to repeat twice their most important lessons to imprint them better in the minds of their listeners. That’s why Jesus tells the parable that contains a second teaching almost identical to the previous one.
We find the same inconsistencies: the explosion of an uncontrolled joy of the woman who finds the coin and the feast to which friends and neighbors are invited.
Compared to the parable of the sheep there is a new element: the very lively description of the woman’s concern, her effort, patience and perseverance in the search for the coin: “lights a lamp and sweeps the house in a thorough search”. It is the image of God who is not resigned to losing one of his creatures (the number ten is a symbol of the whole community) and that does not sit at the eternal dinner banquet until the last of his children has not entered his house.
The three parables emphasize the complementary aspects of conversion. The first two stress God’s initiative, not man’s, in the conversion process. It is God who is always looking for those who are lost.
The parable of the “prodigal son” (Lk 15:11-32) highlights God’s respect for human freedom. The Father does not force his children to stay indoors nor even compels them to return: He can wait.
There is a video by Fr. Fernando Armellini with English subtitles
commenting on today’s Gospel reading: