Gospel: March 29, 2025
March 29, 2025 (Saturday)
3rd Week of Lent
Psalter: Week 3 / (Violet)
Ps 51:3-4, 18-19, 20-21ab
It is mercy I desire, and not sacrifice.
1st Reading: Hosea 6:1-6
Gospel: Luke 18:9-14
Jesus told another parable to some people, fully convinced of their own righteousness, who looked down on others: “Two men went up to the temple to pray; one was a Pharisee, and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself, and said, ‘I thank you, God, that I am not like other people, grasping, crooked, adulterous, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, and give a tenth of all my income to the temple.’ In the meantime, the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘O God, be merciful to me, a sinner.’ I tell you, when this man went back to his house, he had been reconciled with God, but not the other. For whoever makes himself out to be great will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be raised up.”
Reflection:
“Let us strive to know the Lord.”
Saint Augustine said that to know oneself, one has to know God and vice versa. In other words, we only understand ourselves fully in relation to God, and when we break that relationship, we cease to understand ourselves and what our lives are all about. And so, God says, “it is love that I desire, not sacrifice; it is knowledge of God, not burnt offerings.” God wants to be known and loved so that he can bless us and help us to grow. Religious practice without that love or desire to know the Lord is empty and brings no growth, neither in ourselves as human beings, nor in our relationship with God. This is why the Pharisee goes home unaffected by his prayer, while the tax collector, in his honest repentance, goes home reconciled with God. The Pharisee, though praying, is focused on himself. It’s a self-love which has closed in on itself. In contrast, the tax collector is focused on God, whom he knows to be merciful, just as he knows himself to be a sinner. So, “let us strive to know the Lord” so that we can receive his life-giving mercy, “like spring rain that waters the earth.”
