In today’s Gospel Jesus says
to beware of religious leaders
who go around in long robes
and recite long prayers
and sit in places of honor
in houses of worship.
to beware of religious leaders
who go around in long robes
and recite long prayers
and sit in places of honor
in houses of worship.
I hope you will listen to me anyway.
The contrast Jesus draws between the poor widow,
who gives everything she has, little as it is,
and those rich people who give much more
but still remain wealthy,
is a familiar one.
But sometimes we miss the fact that this story
is something of a two-edged sword.
On the one hand,
Christians have traditionally heard in Jesus’ words
implicit praise for the widow’s sacrifice,
which in its unrestricted generosity
mirrors Jesus’ own gift of himself
for the life of the world:
what counts is not how much you give
but the fact that you give your all.
And this is certainly true:
Christ calls his followers to give their all
for the sake of his kingdom,
to follow him on the way of the cross.
On the other hand,
we might notice that Jesus
does not draw the widow to our attention
to praise her generosity
but to drive home his denunciation
of the Temple scribes who,
as he puts it, “devour the houses of widows.”
In giving all she has in paying the Temple tax,
the widow’s life and livelihood are
consumed by the Temple leaders.
Jesus seems to be pointing her out as an example
of how the greedy scribes use religious duty
as a pretext to take from the poor
everything that they possess
in order to enrich themselves
and enhance their status.
This incident is therefore at least as much
a denunciation of religious corruption
as it is a call to imitate the widow’s generosity.
I don’t think we have to choose
between these options.
We can both praise the widow
and denounce the scribes;
we can both value someone’s religious devotion
while criticizing their corrupt religious leaders.
This is important because our world is, alas,
not all that different from Jesus’ world.
In our own day, corruption often lurks
within our religious institutions
and evil hides behind the mask
of piety and clerical privilege:
the long robes and long prayers
and the seats of honor in holy places.
We see it in our own house,
in the sexual abuse catastrophe
that over the past twenty years has laid bare
the ways in which some of our religious leaders
have committed heinous acts
behind the façade of holiness
or have hidden and enabled such act
in the name of protecting
the Church’s reputation.
The corruption Jesus denounces,
which consumes the lives
of the weak and defenseless,
is something that is all too with us.
What comfort can the Gospel offer
in the face of such a realities?
There are at least two things
that we should keep in mind.
First, Jesus is on the side
of people like the widow—
the poor and defenseless
who are constantly at risk
of abuse and exploitation—
and not on the side of guys like me
with our long robes and long prayers
and our seats of honor in holy places.
Or, rather, he is only on the side
of guys like me
to the extent that I am on the side
of people like the widow.
When the final day of judgment comes
I will not be asked
“did you defend the reputation of the Church?”
but “did you comfort the afflicted?”
“did you speak up for the voiceless?”
“did you bear witness to my healing love?”
It is true that the Church has taken significant steps
to correct past evils and avoid future ones,
and we should not be afraid to point this out.
But we should not let our desire to tell this truth
ever obscure the deeper truth
that Jesus is on the side of the victims
and of those who stand with them;
that they matter to him far more
than the reputation of the Church.
Second, because Jesus is on the side of victims
he will not allow the corruption
of religious leaders and institutions
to deprive the people of God of his grace.
It is long-standing Catholic teaching,
stretching back at least to St. Augustine,
that the sins of the Church’s ministers
cannot keep God from working
through the Church and her sacraments.
As Augustine puts it:
“The spiritual power of the sacrament
is indeed comparable to light:
those to be enlightened receive it in its purity,
and if it should pass through defiled beings,
it is not itself defiled” (In Joannis 5.15).
The Temple remained God’s house
despite the defiling corruption of its scribes,
and the generosity of the widow
remained worthy of reward
even if it was exploited.
So too for us the grace of the sacraments
retains its purity and remains effective
even if it is a sinner who administers them,
provided it falls on good ground in our hearts.
In the mystery of God’s mercy
Christ our great high priest makes use
of fallible, frail, and even wicked ministers
as instruments of salvation
whose flaws cannot finally thwart God’s power.
as instruments of salvation
whose flaws cannot finally thwart God’s power.
God has willed that on the last day
the Church will be his spotless bride:
a Church whose leaders are humble
and do not exploit the weak and defenseless,
a Church whose ministers’ lives reflect the purity
of the sacraments they administer.
But it should be clear to anyone
with eyes to see and ears to hear
that we are not there yet.
But it is our faith that,
as we journey toward God’s kingdom,
Christ journeys with us still,
present in his word and sacraments,
humbling the proud,
consoling the sorrowful,
healing the wounded,
ever-faithful even when we are faithless.
This should make us hopeful
even as it makes us humble,
and it should inspire us to pray more fervently
that God would have mercy on us all.
