Is 43:16-21; Ps 125(126); Phil 3:8-14; Jn 8:1-11
The Better Way
Dear friends, today is the fifth Sunday of Lent. Next Sunday will be Palm Sunday, the triumphal entry of our Saviour into Jerusalem. Today’s readings talk to us about the “Better way”. There is always a better way of doing things. Advancements in science and technology have brought new and better ways of doing things. If mobile phones have made communication more efficient, smartphones will make it even better. Medical science and technology have helped save many lives that would have ended prematurely. Smart farming has increased the production of food, hence feeding more people. God himself decided to change the way he was communicating with his people. When the prophets had failed to express God’s love, he sent his own Son to the world.
Jesus taught us the new way of dealing with one another: “Do not judge and you will not be judged” (Mt. 7:1); no revenge, “If someone hits you on the right cheek, turn to him the left one” (Mt 5:39); and in today’s Gospel, “If you have never sinned, be the first to throw a stone” (Jn 8:7)
Prophet Isaiah alluded to the advent of this Good News. He says, “No need to recall the past, no need to think about what was done before. See, I am doing a new deed”.
St. Paul boasts about discovering the new way in Christ Jesus. He says, “I look on everything as so much rubbish if only I can have Christ and be given a place in Him”. Similar conviction like that of St. Paul is what impelled the Martyrs not to look back when they were persecuted. Paul says that to be righteous by following the law was very tedious and almost impossible. This was because the law is never perfect. Now he has learnt a new way, that of faith in Jesus Christ, which makes him authentically free. Some people think that living according to the tenets of Christian faith is not freedom. They opt for worldliness. The fact is that while God is ever merciful to us when we repent, the world does not have mercy on anyone.
In the Gospel reading, Jesus caught many of the Jews off guard by the way he dealt with the case they had brought to him. Following their old ways of doing things, the Jewish leaders came to Jesus with a woman purported to have been caught in the act of adultery. They thought that they had cornered Jesus. If he condemned her, the people would stop believing in him. If he refused to condemn her, they would accuse him of going against the law of Moses. Jesus used a new way of making everyone of them introspect. Maybe this is the first time that many of them had done so. By appealing to the conscience of each one, Jesus was able to rescue the woman. Have you taken time to introspect and see if the way you do things is just? Have you?
We have so much evil being perpetuated against women, children, and the lowly of society even today. There is a lot of ‘mob injustice’ in our society in the name of customs, traditions, and ideologies that people adhere to. Gender discrimination, negative ethnicity, racism, imperialism, etc., continue to cloud the minds of the people. The mighty continue to commit heinous crimes against the poor and the lowly and get away with it. The religious leaders who are supposed to be the conscience of society and the voice of the voiceless have been silenced with money. They dine with the powerful and the wealthy to enrich themselves. They welcome the corrupt to promote their ideologies in places of worship. They allow political propaganda in holy places where the word of God is proclaimed. Who will then appeal to the conscience of the crooked?
Dear friends, the world has a lot of evil in progress, not because there are many evil people, but because of the silence and the indifference of the “righteous” people. Faith communities are meant to counteract the evil formations. Jesus has shown us that the easiest way to turn away evil is by appealing to the conscience. There is always a better way of doing things.
Have a blessed Sunday.
Fr. Lawrence Muthee, SVD
SVD JAMBO KENTAN 