Gospel of 12 August 2020
Wednesday of the Eighteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Matthew 18:15-20
If your brother listens to you, you have won back your brother
Jesus said to his disciples: ‘If your brother does something wrong, go and have it out with him alone, between your two selves. If he listens to you, you have won back your brother. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you: the evidence of two or three witnesses is required to sustain any charge. But if he refuses to listen to these, report it to the community; and if he refuses to listen to the community, treat him like a pagan or a tax collector.
‘I tell you solemnly, whatever you bind on earth shall be considered bound in heaven; whatever you loose on earth shall be considered loosed in heaven.
‘I tell you solemnly once again, if two of you on earth agree to ask anything at all, it will be granted to you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three meet in my name, I shall be there with them.’
Reflexion
Taken out of its context, it would seem that the Lord is merely proposing here a method for fraternal correction and conflict resolution. How do you manage conflicts and disagreements in a community?
But you need to recall that today’s text continues from yesterday’s gospel passage which ended with the parable of the lost sheep. How can we make a connexion between the two? What our Lord is proposing in today’s passage continues from yesterday’s theme - that we should imitate God’s care for His people by seeking the lost.
In other words, we should not just be concerned with keeping the peace in our communities by either tolerating or purging the black sheep therein, but we should be zealous in fighting for the souls of those who are wayward. Let’s be honest; allowing wrongdoings to continue unchecked or expelling trouble makers from the community are much easier and cleaner options. Searching for the lost sheep, working hard to bring the lost sheep back to the fold, would be the greater challenge. And that is the challenge which our Lord throws to all of us.
Our Lord reminds us that it is charity and not meanness which calls us to offer fraternal correction to our brethren. We do it not because we wish to shame the person (that is why we should first seek to do it privately), but we do it because we love this brother or sister.
If the first stage does not bear fruit, then one needs to call for other witnesses. Again, the intention is not to humiliate the person but to allow him to hear the perspective of others too. The motivation is always reconciliation.
Finally, if the first and second approach do not bring the person around, there is a need for the community, or the Church, to intervene. The Church’s role is to reconcile the sinner. She is a field hospital who offers pastoral care and governance through her ministers, and who administers healing through her sacraments. And where the person remains adamant and chooses not to repent, there is the final recourse of excommunication. Again this course of action is not meant to be punitive but seeks to awaken the sinner by showing him that his actions have put him outside the community of believers.
Thus our Lord confers on the Church and its leaders the authority to bind and release, to excommunicate and to reconcile. Both these powers are meant to reconcile the sinner rather than punish and exclude the sinner permanently. It’s good to remember that behind the binding and the loosing that we see in verse 18, stands the praying of verse 19. Above and beyond her duty to reconcile sinners, the Church has a duty to continue praying for all sinners and for their conversion. Let this be our mission and prayer too.