Sunday of Publican and Pharisee

On this Sunday we read the Gospel parable of the Publican and the Pharisee. Our Lord tells us that two men went into the temple to pray – one was a Pharisee who was diligent in keeping the fasts and all the rules of the Jewish law and the other was a Publican, a lowly and despised tax collector. The Pharisee stood in the temple with great confidence and pride, thanking God that he was not like other men. The Publican stood in the back of the temple and could hardly raise his eyes to heaven, only crying out ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ Our Lord Jesus Christ makes the point that it was the prayer of the Publican that was pleasing in God’s sight – “for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Why is it that on this day - which inaugurates the services preparing us for Great Lent - why is it that the Church places before us this image of the Publican and the Pharisee? It is an important and instructive thing which our holy mother Church desires to emphasize for us as we prepare ourselves for the season of the great and holy fast.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, isn’t it so often the case that we look upon Great Lent as a time of deprivation, of restrictions, of fasting from certain foods, of the demands of longer prayers and more frequent services in the Church? These things are true… it is a time of increased struggle against our passions, it is a time to refrain from eating certain foods, and it is a time where more services are offered in the Church.

And if we make an effort to diligently attend to these struggles… to carefully watch over what we eat and how much we eat, to attend to the many services of the Lenten period, to avail ourselves of spiritual reading and increase our prayers… we are doing a good thing and there is much benefit for our souls to be had in following the rigors of the demands of Great Lent.

But what is our Gospel parable teaching us today? What is the message which the Church wishes to impart to us as we look ahead to Great Lent?

The message is this: If our concentration is only on fulfilling the rules of Great Lent… we run the risk of basking in the self-satisfying and self-justifying attitude of the Pharisee. If we look upon Great Lent simply as a time which makes demands on our diet, on disrupting our worldly distractions, on compelling a sense of obligation to attend certain services… then we are sadly missing the mark of what Great Lent is all about. We will either congratulate ourselves to the degree we are able to adhere to the fast, or we will frustrate and depress ourselves to the degree that we fall short of the demands of the fast. Neither of which will help us one bit on the path toward our salvation.

The message being emphasized by the Lord in his parable of the Publican and the Pharisee, and the message being emphasized by our holy mother Church in preparing us for Great Lent, is that the season of Lent is a call to repentance, to self-examination, to recognizing the greatness and the goodness of our God and to understand the tragedy of our exile from Him.

Last night, in the Matins service for this day we heard the beautiful hymn of repentance, which cried out: ‘Open unto me, O Giver of Life, the gates of repentance: for early in the morning my spirit seeks Thy holy temple, bearing a temple of the body all defiled.  But in Thy compassion cleanse it by Thy lovingkindness and Thy mercy.’

This is the message which the Holy Church is emphasizing to us, dear brothers and sisters! This is the message of our Lord Jesus Christ – who calls us to repent… to turn away from all that distracts us or pulls us away from God’s love.

The discipline of the Pharisee should soften our hearts and inspire us to the humility of the Publican. And that humility of the Publican should fill our hearts with love and gratitude, inspiring us to express that love and gratitude with the discipline of the Pharisee.

May God grant us this integrated and holistic approach to our prayer and fasting. First of all, granting us a contrite and broken heart like the Publican, which cries out to God: ‘Be merciful to me a sinner!’ And may that love and mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ then inspire and strengthen us to recognize His words: ‘If you love me, you will keep My commandments.’ Letting our Lenten efforts of fasting, of prayer, of disciplining our lives to be in accordance with Christ’s commandments – letting all this be an expression of our deep love and gratitude to God. And may that cycle of ‘love inspiring effort’ and ‘effort inspiring love’ cascade like a snowball, so that our love increases our efforts and our efforts increase our love.