Homily for 29th Sunday of Ordinary Time Year A
2014
Isaiah 45:1, 4-6 • I Thess 1:1-5 • Matthew 22:15-21
Introduction
Every priest or deacon is aware that his
homily will probably affect people differently.
Two years ago around election time, a priest friend was preaching at a
church in the area. And faithfully
following the bishop’s instructions, he steered clear of partisan politics,
that is, he avoided telling the parishioners who to vote for. Rather, he spoke about how Catholic teaching
touches upon the various hot button issues of our society: marriage, sexuality,
immigration, poverty, death-penalty etc.
He was happy with himself, for what he thought was a job well done.
But at the end of Mass, as he was walking
down the aisle, barely getting to the main door, a visibly angry parishioner
came accosting him verbally: “Why did you preach against my party, my
candidate?” And before storming off the
parishioner told him to leave out politics and preach only about God, telling
the priest: “Give unto Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to
God.”
My priest-friend was still recovering from
this when a few minutes later, as people continued filing by when another
parishioner came to him with an axe to grind.
But this time, her complaint was quite the opposite: “Father, why were
you so wishy-washy in your homily? Why
did you not just come out and tell us who to vote for? Why don’t you give us very clear
instructions?”
Scripture and Theology
Jesus faces a similar problem in today’s
gospel, but this time the two groups who don’t like each other, are conniving
to bring him down: Pharisees and Herodians.
·
The Pharisees were deeply religious and nationalistic; they hated the
Romans who were occupying their nation.
·
The Herodians on the other hand were very secular and were willing
collaborators with the occupying Romans.
But now
these two diametrically opposed groups join hands and come to entrap
Jesus. I guess as they say, my enemy’s
enemy could be my friend. And so they ask
him this loaded question: “Is it lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar or not?”
This would be like someone asking you
today, “Have you stopped beating your wife?”
A “yes” or
“no” answer puts you between a rock and a hard place. A “yes” or “no” answer would have put Jesus
in a Catch-22 situation.
·
If Jesus said, “Yes it is lawful to pay taxes to the Romans,” the
Pharisees, who opposed Roman occupation, would say: “Aah. We got you.
You are a Roman collaborator. You
have betrayed God and our nation.”
·
But if Jesus said “No, it is not lawful to pay taxes to the Romans,”
the Herodians would immediately hand him to the authorities as a subversive,
one encouraging people to evade taxes.
The IRS would come after him.
Jesus
is too smart for their trap. He does not
give a “Yes or No” answer. Instead he asks
for the coin with which the tax is to be paid.
He points out to them that this coin bears the face of the Emperor and
then gives the famous reply: “. . . repay
to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.”
This
answer is famous, not just because it gets Jesus out of a tight spot, escaping
the accusation of being either a traitor or a subversive. But this answer is especially important because
in it Jesus teaches us the basic relationship between Christians and the
society in which we live. Not only
should Christians give allegiance to legitimate civil authority, Christians
must also participate fully in society, in the meantime obeying God and working
for the things of heaven.
We cannot
be like the Pharisees or Herodians, who choose one or the other. The Pharisees chose religion, the Herodians
chose government. Today some people
speak about separation of Church and State in much the same way, suggesting
that the two have thing to do with each other, like the man who accosted my
priest-friend. They think that Church
life begins when you enter those doors and stops as soon as you exit the
Church. They want you to choose between
Town Hall and the Cathedral, between the mayor and the bishop.
This
thinking is wrong. Jesus said: “Give to
Caesar what belongs to Caesar AND to
God what belongs to God.” Jesus did not
gives us multiple choice, where we have to choose either to give to Caesar or
to give to God. We must attend to both,
especially because the truth is this: everything belongs to God, even that
which we give to Caesar. Jesus simply
makes this distinction because the things of Caesar will end on this side of
death; while there are other things that will survive death and will live on in
the world to come, where we shall be with God.
Christian Life
And so as Christians, our involvement in
this world is not an optional extra. We
give to Caesar when we involve ourselves fully in transforming this world and
bringing it under the kingship of Jesus Christ.
At the Final Resurrection, this is the world that Jesus will hand back
to the Father, not some other world in some other galaxy, but this world. And that is why, we cannot brush off this
world; we must begin living heaven here on this earth. How might we do this?
First, from the very beginning of
Christianity, Christians have been known for caring for the poor and
needy. In fact, that is what won them
the admiration of many pagans, especially because Christians cared, not just for
their own poor, but for all who were needy.
Now if this earthly world was not important, why would be we concerned
about earthly things like food, water, clothing, medicine, education, housing,
even the environment? We care about
these things, we care about our society, because what happens here on earth has
effects for life in heaven. When we
ensure that Caesar’s society on this earth has life and life to the fullest, we
are already beginning the experience of heaven, of life with God.
Secondly, we have to give to Caesar in our
family life and in our work. Especially
as lay people, your theatre of operation is in family and work. You fathers and mothers give of yourselves
completely to your children, feeding them, clothing them, teaching them, disciplining
them. These things which belong to this
side of heaven, prepare us for the Kingdom.
When you go to work, in an office or at a worksite, in public or private
service, self-employed or under a boss, your job is your theatre of operation,
the place where your Christian faith is revealed, not just in words, but in the
way you do your work. You are giving
Caesar what belongs to Caesar, but in reality all you are giving will return to
God eventually. That is why Church
teaching takes family life and work life very seriously.
Finally, we have the issue of political life. Despite the temptation towards cynicism in
politics today, we cannot dismiss political life as if it were useless. That is why in the first reading, we heard
that God used King Cyrus, a pagan king as his instrument to liberate the Jewish
People. Respect for the legitimate role
of government is part of our giving to Caesar what belongs to Caesar. But we must also take up our civic role, in
voting, in going to town hall meetings, in standing for election ourselves –
Christians do these things, because we want to transform this world and make it
ready for the Lord. When Jesus returns
at the Final Judgement, he will find a world that is nearly ready to be given
to the Father.
Conclusion
There is a prayer the priest says at Mass
during the season of Advent. In that
prayer, we pray that the Lord “may teach
us to judge wisely the things of earth and hold firm to the things of heaven.” For we are dual citizens; although our
primary citizenship is in heaven, we currently travel under the passport of our
earthly citizenship. As we work to
acquiring the passport to eternal life, let us take up fully our rights and our
duties in this earthly city, as we also hold on to and work towards ensuring
our permanent citizenship in heaven.
No comments:
Post a Comment