Twenty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Twenty-Third Sunday in Ordinary Time

Father Ben Riley

The Scriptures offer us a kind of blueprint for a happy and fulfilled life. God is our Creator. He knows us better than we know ourselves, and he desires to have a loving relationship with us. It makes sense, therefore, that if we want to live well, we should follow the path God has laid out for us in Scripture and through his Church. 

Of course, it would not be quite right to say that one part of Scripture is more important than another. The Old Testament prefigures the New, and the New Testament fulfills the Old. Nevertheless, certain passages speak more directly to the circumstances of our daily lives. 

Most of us will never be asked to build an ark, confront Pharaoh, or spend three days in the belly of a great fish. But every one of us will experience conflict. Every one of us will be hurt by someone we love. And every one of us will eventually face the difficult question: How do I tell someone that what he is doing is wrong without damaging our relationship? 

I know that I have not always handled that well. 

Last year, I had an argument with one of my oldest friends. We have known each other since the sixth grade, so this was not a new or fragile friendship. We know each other very well. 

At the time, he and his fiancée-now his wife-were preparing to be married in the Church. During a phone conversation, I asked him how their marriage preparation was going and whether they were finding it fruitful. 

He told me that he and the priest had spoken mostly about medical ethics, which was a subject that interested him. I asked whether they had discussed other areas of morality as well. I then told him that being married in the Church involved publicly professing the Catholic faith, including the moral teachings of the Church. 

Perhaps the conversation could still have gone well at that point. But then I made a serious mistake. I brought up a particular moral teaching with which I knew my friend struggled and encouraged him to discuss it with his pastor at their next meeting. 

He became very upset with me. Looking back, I understand why. 

The teaching of the Church was not wrong, and it was not necessarily wrong for me to be concerned about my friend. But I had not sufficiently considered whether that moment, that setting, or that manner of speaking would allow him to receive what I wanted to say. I was focused on telling him something true, but I had not asked whether I was saying it in the most loving and fruitful way. 

It is possible to say the right thing in the wrong way. It is possible to speak the truth without first preparing the ground for the truth to be heard. 

That is why today’s Gospel is so practical. Jesus does not merely tell us that we should correct one another. He teaches us how to address conflict as Christians. 

Jesus says, “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.” 

Notice first what Jesus does not say. He does not tell us to search for every fault in our brother. He does not appoint us as supervisors of everyone else’s spiritual life. He begins with a specific situation: “If your brother sins against you.” 

There are times when love may require us to speak about a serious sin that is not directly against us, especially when we have some particular responsibility for that person. Parents must guide their children. Pastors must sometimes warn their flock. Close friends may sometimes need to speak honestly to one another. 

But not every fault we notice is ours to correct. 

Pope Leo XIII offered this striking advice: “Busy not yourself… about things which do not… concern you…. For meddling comes of secret pride and from vain presumption.” 

That is a challenging examination of conscience. Sometimes we convince ourselves that we are correcting another person out of charity when the matter is really none of our business. Our correction may come not from love, but from curiosity, irritation, or a hidden feeling of superiority. 

Before correcting someone, then, we should ask ourselves: Has God actually entrusted this matter to my care? Has this person sinned against me? Am I responsible for this person in a particular way? Is this matter serious enough that love requires me to speak? Or am I inserting myself into something that, honestly, does not concern me? 

And even when correction is necessary, we must begin by examining ourselves. 

Am I speaking because I love this person, or because I am angry? Do I desire their good, or do I simply want to prove that I am right? Am I willing to listen to them, or have I already judged the entire situation? Have I prayed for them before I began to speak? 

Jesus tells us elsewhere to remove the wooden beam from our own eye before attempting to remove the splinter from our brother’s eye. He does not say that the splinter should never be addressed. He says that correction must come from someone who recognizes his own need for mercy. We are sinners who need to love other sinners. 

That was another part of my mistake with my friend. I did not make sufficiently clear that I, too, am a sinner. I spoke as though I were standing safely on the side of righteousness, pointing toward his failure. I failed to approach him as one sinner speaking to another sinner, both of us equally dependent upon the mercy of Jesus Christ. 

The Church is also very careful to distinguish the sin from the sinner. We can recognize that an action is objectively wrong. We can recognize that something involves grave matter because God has revealed the moral law. But we cannot see another person’s heart. 

For a sin to be mortal, three things are necessary: grave matter, full knowledge, and deliberate consent. We may recognize the grave matter, but we cannot know completely how much another person understood, what his intentions were, or how freely he acted. 

We can judge an action, but we cannot pronounce a final judgment upon a soul. 

Fraternal correction says, “I love you too much to pretend that this does not matter.” Condemnation says, “Your sin defines who you are, and I have placed myself above you.” Those are two very different attitudes. 

We must also remember that it is not our responsibility to force another person to change. You are not your friend’s savior. You are not your spouse’s savior. You are not your child’s savior. Jesus Christ is the Savior. 

Our responsibility is to love them, pray for them, offer a faithful example and, when love truly requires it, speak the truth gently. Then we must entrust them to Christ. We cannot force conversion. In fact, our attempts to control another person may push him further away from God. 

Oftentimes the most effective correction is not an argument, but the quiet witness of a holy and joyful life. 

Jesus then gives us a gradual process. First, speak to the person privately. Do not gossip about him. Do not recruit an army of people to take your side. Speak first to the person who has hurt you. 

And only if he refuses to listen should one or two others become involved. And only after that should the matter be brought to the authority of the Church. At every stage, as few people as possible are involved. Jesus protects both truth and the reputation of the sinner. 

Then we reach perhaps the most heartbreaking words in this Gospel: “If he refuses to listen even to the Church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector.” 

Sometimes a person repeatedly refuses to acknowledge the harm he is causing. If someone continually violates our dignity, ignores reasonable boundaries, or places us or others in danger, it may become necessary to step away from the relationship. 

Forgiveness does not require pretending that nothing happened, and forgiveness does not mean allowing someone to continue hurting us. Reconciliation requires truth, repentance, and the gradual rebuilding of trust. 

Yet even then, Jesus does not permit us to hate that person. How did Jesus treat Gentiles and tax collectors? He continued to love them. He prayed for them, called them to conversion, and desired to bring them back into communion with God. 

Distance may sometimes be necessary; contempt never is. We can establish a boundary while continuing to pray for someone’s conversion and hoping that the relationship may one day be restored. 

Jesus tells us the purpose of this entire process in one beautiful sentence: “If he listens to you, you have won over your brother.” 

The goal is not to win the argument. The goal is to win over our brother. 

Looking back upon that conversation with my friend, I wish I had handled it differently. Perhaps I still needed to say something, but I needed to speak with greater humility. I needed to consider whether it was the right moment, whether I was the right person, and whether I was speaking in a way that he could receive. 

Above all, I needed to remember that I was not his judge and certainly not his savior. I was simply his friend-a fellow sinner trying to follow Jesus. 

The next time you experience conflict, remember the path Christ has laid out before us: begin with humility, speak privately, tell the truth with charity, listen carefully, and desire reconciliation. 

Before we speak, let us ask: Am I trying to win an argument, or am I trying to win over my brother? 

Because for the Christian, being right is never enough. Our words must also be loving, humble, and directed toward communion. That is how Christ addresses us in our sin, and that is how he asks us to address one another.