Fifth Sunday of Lent (C) [Jn 8: 1-11]
03.04.2022
The
Woman Caught in Adultery
- Theme in brief:
Universality
of sinfulness and need for mercy
- Focus Statement:
Since the existence of sin is universal in all human beings, instead
of only condemning other sinners, all of us are called to accept our own
sinfulness and need for repentance and forgiveness from merciful God.
- Explanation of the text
The episode of the woman caught in
adultery in today’s gospel puts into practice the message
of the parable of the Prodigal Son (Lk 15:11-32). In this incident, the younger
son of that parable is the woman caught in “the very act of committing adultery”
(8:4) standing before Jesus and her accusers (namely, the scribes and Pharisees) with
all her brokenness,
guilt, shame and fear. This text draws a sharp contrast
between the ruthless treatment of the scribes and Pharisees towards her and the
overflowing compassion of Jesus. Their
hidden agenda is to use her and her weakness as a tool to accuse and condemn
Jesus to death. Their intention is not to reform her (sinner) but to use her for their purpose. Naturally,
they represent the elder son in Prodigal Son’s parable. It is clear
that the one who is really on trial in this episode is not the woman, but Jesus. Finally, the compassionate father portrayed in
the Prodigal Son’s story is none other than Jesus himself, who extends his arms
of compassion and forgiveness towards a broken woman.
What we observe in
today’s text is a well-planned trap laid by the scribes and Pharisees to catch
Jesus. While he is teaching in the
Instead of pronouncing judgement
on the woman, Jesus pronounces such a judgement on the judges themselves! He
responds by challenging his challengers to examine whether anyone of them never
had, if not a desire to do the same thing (that is, to commit adultery)
themselves, any other sinful desire at all. He asks such a person to be the first
to throw a stone
at her (8:7). He says in effect: “All right. You may stone her, provided you
never had any sinful desire!” Jesus does not condone sins (i.e. does not say that what she
did was alright) but forgives a sinner and gives her another chance.
By saying “from now on do not sin again” (8:11), he implies that sin is
sin. But by saying “neither do I condemn
you” (8:11), he offers God’s forgiveness to the sinner. He does not approve sin
but forgives the sinner out of his infinite mercy. By his compassion towards
her, he wants to touch her (also our) heart so that this undeserving gesture of mercy may
lead to a change
of heart. He not only restores
her broken relationship with God by forgiving her, but also restores her to the
fellowship of her community by telling her not to sin again.
- Application
to life
Today’s
gospel gives a vivid illustration of God’s boundless mercy or compassion offered in and through Jesus to a
broken-hearted sinner. There are three characters in today’s gospel: the sinful
woman, the scribes and Pharisees and Jesus. We cannot but admit that each one
of us has something of the first two types. But the third character, namely of
Jesus, may not come in us automatically. We always stand in need of conversion
to be merciful like Jesus towards sinners and offenders. Let
us take all the three characters one by one.
First of all, it is clear
that the sinful woman represents those who do something terribly wrong under vulnerable circumstances and stand in need of mercy rather than condemnation.
Jesus gives all
those who have messed up their life further chances to make amendments by applying the balm of compassion on their
emotional wounds and guilty conscience. He offers the worst of sinners not
condemnation but forgiveness and salvation.
Secondly, the scribes and
Pharisees represent those who accuse
and condemn other wrongdoers with the
false assumption
that they are the most righteous or virtuous. They use the woman as a tool to trap,
catch and condemn Jesus. Totally disregarding her feelings of shame,
humiliation and fear, they use her weakness to cook up a charge against Jesus
so that they will be able to eliminate him. Their attitude towards authority is
very much alive even today in our society. For them authority
is meant for catching, censoring and
condemning the offenders. It never occurs to them that it should be used to
correct, reform and bring such
persons to the right path. They never use their authority for curing or healing, but only for catching any violators of the laws and punishing them.
Thirdly, Jesus represents the face of the Heavenly Father’s mercy. Jesus’
attitude towards a sinner becomes further clear from this episode. Instead of judging
the woman, Jesus passed a judgment on the judges themselves. At the end, the
accusers themselves turned out to be the accused. Jesus had already taught
earlier: “Do not judge, so that you
may not be judged” (Mt 7:1). He said that those who judge others severely are like those who notice
the speck in their neighbour’s eye and
fail to notice a log in their own eyes (Mt 7:3-5). By
regularly judging others harshly, are we not continually ‘casting stones’ at our opponents/ adversaries? Many of us
have a common weakness to demand strict
standards from
others that we ourselves do not observe; or to judge and condemn others for faults we ourselves commit.
Since all those who are in authority, including priests who sit in
the confessional to forgive sins of others, are not perfect, today Jesus invites all of them to admit that they are ‘wounded healers.’ If we were caught for any crime, naturally
we would have expected sympathetic and understanding approach from others, and
surely not severe condemnation or harsh treatment. Our natural emotion towards
criminals and sinners is anger and aversion. We need God’s strength, which
comes from praying for such people repeatedly, to overcome such negative emotions and substitute them with compassion or pity. Without supernatural grace,
it is really heard for us as human beings to move from, “Let him/her go to
hell; I have nothing to do with him/her,” to “how to bring back that person to
the right path.”
Like Pharisees we too are
interested only in condemning sinners and do not like to forgive them or try to
reform them. We have a tendency to exaggerate the sins of others while
overlooking evil and sinfulness in ourselves. Whenever
we judge others, we need to recognize the Pharisee lurking in us who thinks and
says: “The way he treats his wife, I never do;” “the way she dresses up, I feel
shameful;” ‘the way their children behave, we can never imagine our children
behaving like that;” and “look at the way they show off their wealth”……How will
I feel, if I will suddenly receive an anonymous letter one day which will say:
“You are a hypocrite and a double-bluff.” God alone can judge sinners; we have no right to
condemn them. Our genuine repentance has the power to cause every scribe and
Pharisee in us to walk away by casting aside the stones we hold to cast at
others. When we realize that we sometimes condemn others of what we are guilty
of ourselves, ‘the stones’ in our hands begin to shake and gradually fall down.
Of course this does not mean that we should never point out any of people’s faults or disapprove
what is wrong. We must learn to do it without condemning the wrongdoers and do
it out of concern for their and
society’s good, even though they may not like it.
We observe in our society
even today people who act as ‘moral police
force’ or ‘watch-dogs’ with the belief that it is justified to
punish/ thrash/ threaten those who do not fit into their ‘moral standards.’ Quite
often such strict standards are conceived for gaining power or control over people. Often we are unaware of
the circumstance, background and
inescapable traps that drive sinners to commit sins. Who knows, if we were in
their place we too would have fallen like them or not! Jesus asks not only
those scribes and Pharisees but also all of us to look into our own consciences and see whether we are fully clean before we accuse others. All of us are
sinners and are in need of God’s mercy and forgiveness. Today’s gospel-message
makes each one of us aware of this grim truth: “If not for God’s grace, today I
too would have been one of the worst criminals or sinners.”
Though punishment or penal action has its function in
human society to prevent crimes, it is a limited
function. It may create some fear
in the offenders not to commit such crimes any more. But it does not lead to a change of heart in sinners. On the contrary,
punishment may create further resentment/
bitterness/ revenge in the hearts of such offenders. As Christ’s disciples we need not use any
authority given to us only for punishing the wrongdoers, but pro-actively look
for opportunities to go beyond punishment. According to world’s way of thinking
an offender deserves punishment, but according to Jesus such a person also deserves our mercy. When a sinner experiences undeserved
forgiveness, there is a greater possibility that it would motivate him/her to live give up sinful ways. Of
course, these principles are not meant for applying in institutions. As
administrators/ managers of institutions we need to follow the world’s rules of
punishment/ fine/ demotion/ suspension/ dismissal. Otherwise we will not be
able to run our institutions. But as a disciple of Christ, later on if we
happen to meet the person, against whom we took action, we can tell him or her:
“You must be very angry with me. I am sorry that I had to do it for the sake of
management. But I have nothing
against you. May God bless you.” It does not matter whether that person accepts
this or not; some will, some may not. To the tribal chieftains
who have to impose fines for moral or social
offences in their tribal community, probably Jesus would say: “As
tribal chiefs you may have to take fines from social offenders. But as my disciples,
at the end, can you say that you forgive them as God has forgiven you, and
welcome them back into the fellowship
of your community?”
Every act of unfaithfulness to God and failure to love him
wholeheartedly is a kind of “adultery”
according to biblical symbolism. However, God through Jesus comes in search of us,
“his unfaithful and adulterous wife,” to forgive and save us. Today, once
again, in this Lenten Season, our merciful God, through his Son Jesus, invites
us to repent and receive his forgiving love as the adulterous woman did.
How are we responding to this ‘mad’
love as we prepare ourselves to celebrate Easter? Jesus
wants to teach us that there should be moments in our life when mercy would go beyond strict justice. Justice says: a sin is a sin and is wrong. But mercy says:
“Who am I to condemn you?” Though forgiveness is free, it is not cheap. A serious responsibility is laid upon a forgiven sinner to go and “from
now on do not sin again” (8:11). When
God forgives us unconditionally, he expects us that we begin to live a new life
afterwards. How do we respond to his will in this holy Season?
- Response to God's Word
Is God’s infinite mercy a
motivating force for us to repentance and change our heart? Who do we identify with in this story: the woman, the
accusers or Jesus? If we are the woman, what are we being accused of?
Who is accusing us? If we are the accusers, whom are we accusing? For what
offence? Where
am I in this drama: on the side of the woman or of the crowd? Do I show mercy
towards those who commit social offences and live a scandalous life, or do I
judge them harshly and condemn them outright? Do I follow a double standard in
applying rules and laws: one for men, another for women; one for the rich,
another for the poor; one for my kinship circle, another for outsiders?
- A Prayer
Merciful Lord, we acknowledge the fact that all of us are sinners
before you and are in need of repentance and forgiveness. Through your Son
Jesus, you show your boundless mercy on sinners like us and offer forgiveness
to us in spite of our unfaithfulness. Grant that we may repent for our evil
ways and receive your forgiving love as the adulterous woman did. Having
received forgiveness from you, grant that we too may become ambassadors of
forgiveness and reconciliation, and not harsh judges who only condemn others.
Amen.
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