Being a Good Christian, Being a Sinner

And then yesterday the beginnings of an answer hit me.

I found myself reflecting on the story of Christ dining at the home of a Pharisee. Many of us know the tale: as the man and Jesus dine, a woman (called only a “sinner”) approaches the Lord, washing His feet with her tears, wiping them with her hair, and anointing Him with expensive ointment. As if this were not strange enough, then:

When the Pharisee who had invited him saw this he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, that she is a sinner.” Jesus said to him in reply, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” “Tell me, teacher,” he said. “Two people were in debt to a certain creditor; one owed five hundred days’ wages and the other owed fifty. Since they were unable to repay the debt, he forgave it for both. Which of them will love him more?” Simon said in reply, “The one, I suppose, whose larger debt was forgiven.” He said to him, “You have judged rightly.” Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, “Do you see this woman? When I entered your house, you did not give me water for my feet, but she has bathed them with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but she has not ceased kissing my feet since the time I entered. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she anointed my feet with ointment. So I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven; hence, she has shown great love.  But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” He said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.” The others at table said to themselves, “Who is this who even forgives sins?” But he said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.” (Luke 7:39-50)

“But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” What wisdom in brevity! What force in a simple rebuke to the “righteous!”

All of a sudden I understood why my heart had always been so thankful to God, even after His forgiveness, for the mistakes of my past. Who can know how to love, how to forgive, if he himself has not been forgiven, has not accepted the reality of the need for mercy, seen the depravity in his own soul and bowed his head to the Lord?

No one. No one. We are all sinners, but the true miracle is not simply that our sins may be forgiven, but that the deeper the depravity, still the more profound is God’s mercy. Seeing His love, means being able to manifest it ourselves. The sinful woman may “go in peace” because she has known herself as a sinner, has seen what the world offers and wept.

And so, I realized my gratitude to God meant not that it is better for one to convert than to be raised Catholic; instead, it signaled my awareness that one must be forgiven greatly to love greatly, one must see the depths of his own worthlessness to stand in faith before the fount of love.

Unavoidably, we are sinners; unavoidably, we do wrong. Yet, the paradox of our God is that He seeks us even in our wounds; He shows us the path of love precisely by loving us in the hopelessness of self-pity and self-disgust.

Commenting on the same Gospel story, Meister Eckhart lends us the perfect end to this reflection—a reminder that true peace, true love, comes with striving, with knowing and living love in forgiveness:

It is good if one comes from peace into peace: that is praiseworthy, but imperfect. One should run into peace, but not begin in peace. God means that one should be established in peace and thrust into peace, and one should end in peace […] The man who is running, in a continual run, into peace, is a heavenly man.