Meditation of His Beatitude Patriarch Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa on the XXIII Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A
Below you can find the Meditation of His Beatitude Patriarch Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, for the XXIII Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A, Sunday 10 September 2023.
Mt 18:15-20
In today's passage, (Mt 18:15-20) the act of listening is revealed again as the central idea.
So far, Sunday’s Liturgy has continiously revealed to us the fundamental act of listening to the Word of God, the Word of life. As we have seen, the Word consoles and encourages, but also corrects by speaking the truth, deeply transforming the perspective and the heart of the listener.
In today’s passage, the verb listening returns three times (Mt 18:15,16,17), however, it no longer refers to listening to the Word of God. But listenining to the word of one’s brother, within the community of Jesus' disciples.
The context is one of fragility and sin.
Matthew seems to be saying that the Christian community, like any other community, knows the experience of sin, of fragile and wounded relationships, of relationship problems, the struggle to meet and understand each other: this is a normal part of any coexistence between people.
For example, the book of Acts of the Apostles confirms to us that the early Church often experienced moments of tension and was not unscathed by any of the temptations of the human heart, which create fatigue within relationships, such as: jealousy, injustice, indifference, presumption...
Then, what is the difference in the way this reality is experienced in the Christian community? The difference is all in the word, that is, in the courage and freedom to speak to one another.
Among brothers and sisters in the Christian community, weakness should not be the reason to close a relationship, to interrupt the circle of the word, but rather should become a privileged opportunity to talk to each other. When someone commits a fault, the word, the talking to each other, becomes more necessary so that no one is left alone in their sin: those who have sinned have a "right" to hear a word that will help them shed light and return fully to the bosom of the community.
Whoever listens, even if he has committed any kind of sin, is not excluded from the community, but is again "gained" to the Lord and to his Body, which is the Church ("If your brother commits a sin against you, go and admonish him between you and him alone; if he listens to you, you will have gained your brother" - Mt 18:15).
The community of disciples is not a perfect community, but it is a community where we listen to each other.
And it is a responsibility and power common to all members of the community: Jesus says that when someone commits a fault, the first step is not to delegate to authority the task of intervening and correcting, as is the case elsewhere. In Christian brotherhood each person is responsible for his own brother (Mt 18:15), and no one can feel disempowered from the duty of going in search of his lost brother: for this search for his lost brother is a way of loving him…
This Meditation was originally published on the website of the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem. Please click here to read the full text.