Wednesday of Week 25 of Ordinary Time – Gospel
Commentary on Luke 9:1-6
As we move on to chapter 9, we have left out a number of stories in chapter 8—the calming of a storm on the lake, the healing of a demoniac, the raising of Jairus’ daughter and the healing of a woman with a haemorrhage. However, these are dealt with elsewhere in our readings from the other Gospels. We are now moving into a turning point in the public life of Jesus and in his relationship with his disciples.
This is, in fact, the third tour of Galilee by Jesus. On the first tour he was accompanied just by the four fishermen he had called first—Peter, Andrew, James and John. On the second, all the Twelve were with him and on the third, he was alone after sending out the Twelve on their own mission.
We begin the reading today with Jesus sending his chosen Twelve on their mission. It is the first time he has sent them out on their own without his being with them. Basically, they are to do exactly as their Master does. They are given power over evil forces and to heal sicknesses. They are also to proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom.
They are to travel in total freedom and so are not to bring anything with them which would make traveling more difficult:
Take nothing for your journey: no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money—not even an extra tunic.
It is understood that the people will support them in return for the services they render. It is expected that hospitality will be extended to them in the traditional way of the Middle East.
And they are not to be choosy about where they are received:
Whatever house you enter, stay there, and leave from there.
And, in places where they and their message and their services are not welcome:
…as you are leaving that town shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.
This was a symbolic act which the Pharisees practised when they left an ‘unclean’ gentile area. In this case, the act signifies that people are rejecting not just the disciples, but God himself, whom they bring with their message and their healing.
So they departed and went through the villages, bringing the good news and curing diseases everywhere.
It really was the beginning of the Church. And it was the work of making the Kingdom a reality, God’s will being done on earth.
The same mission is entrusted to each one of us, although it will obviously be adapted to our life situation. We are called, individually and in community, to proclaim the gospel by word and lifestyle. We are called to help liberate people from negative forces and addictions of all kinds that can enslave. We are called to be sources of healing and wholeness, and for this we do not need to be part of the medical profession. We are called to live lives of simplicity, using only those things which we need for life and work and rejecting all superfluity and luxury. As we have already noted: the really rich are those whose needs are the least. It is a message our consumer world needs to hear and see.
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Wednesday of Week 25 of Ordinary Time – First Reading
Commentary on Proverbs 30:5-9
Today we have our last selection of readings from Proverbs. They give us a taste of what the rest of the book is like. In this reading, there are two pieces of advice for us to reflect on.
Our reading today is taken from chapter 30, which begins:
The words of Agur son of Jakeh. An oracle. (Proverbs 30:1)
It is not known who Agur is. He is simply called ‘son of Jakeh the Massaite’. Massa is in northern Arabia and elsewhere referred to as an encampment of the Ishmaelites (Gen 25:13-14). However, the word may not be meant as a place name, but rather signify ‘an oracle’ or ‘a prophecy’.
First we are urged to take refuge in the unalloyed or flawless word of God, which will be our most effective security in life. When we fully assimilate that word, we are endowed with a vision of life which enables us to see where real truth and goodness lie.
At the same time, we are not to play around with God’s word and distort it to suit our own convenience. Moses gave a warning to the Israelites about that long before (Deut 4:2). It is something we can do very easily, especially when we take a text out of its context as some people, including preachers, tend to do. As Shakespeare wrote, “The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose”. It is not at all difficult for us to do the same.
The reading ends with a prayer to God for two things. This begins a section of the chapter called ‘numerical proverbs’. Further on the author introduces sets of proverbs with “three things” and “four things”:
Remove far from me falsehood and lying…
In other words, the writer begs for the gift of integrity. The author desires wholeness, where there is perfect harmony between his inner self and his outward behaviour, and between God’s will and the deepest desires of his heart. Jesus said:
Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God. (Matt 5:8)
He also prays for a basic security in life, that he be supplied with his essential needs. We pray for this when we say the Lord’s Prayer:
Give us each day our daily bread…
He wants neither wealth nor destitution. Both have their dangers. Wealth can alienate one from God. In the arrogance of wealth I may be tempted to say, “God? Who is he? What has he got to do with me? I don’t need him.” We remember the parable of the rich fool with his full barns (Luke 12:13-21). Moses predicted that Israel would forget God when their food was plentiful and their herds large (Deut 8:12-17). The ever-growing prosperity of western society has led to a parallel growth in secularism.
Destitution, on the other hand, can lead to criminal ways in order to survive. In our day of great material prosperity coupled with enormous areas of destitution and poverty, the Christian community can give formidable witness by repudiating the consumerist, hedonistic mentality through living a life of decent simplicity. We also need to work hard to bring about a more equitable sharing of the vast wealth that parts of our world are generating.
This was originally the purpose of religious life and it is still the ideal, but it is not often as visible in the lives of religious as it could be. This is partly because some religious themselves are not immune to the consumerist ‘bug’, but also because the normally simple lifestyle of the majority of religious is not seen enough by people.
In our day, lay people too can give this witness of simplicity, living according to one’s needs. A good definition of a person who is really rich: one whose needs are the least.
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Tuesday of Week 25 of Ordinary Time – Gospel
Commentary on Luke 8:19-21
The mother and brothers of Jesus come looking for him, but they cannot get to him because of the crush of people in the house where he is speaking. Jesus was in Capernaum at the time and Nazareth was about 50 km (30 miles) away. The mention of ‘brothers’ would commonly indicate cousins and not just siblings. When the message is passed in to Jesus, he says to all:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
The story is told in harsher terms in Mark. He has Jesus say, for instance:
Who are my mother and my brothers? (Mark 3:33)
It is suggested there that their purpose was to take him away. On the one hand, they thought he was mad and an embarrassment to the family and, on the other hand, that he might get them into trouble with the authorities because of the provocative things he was saying and doing such as questioning traditional interpretations of the Law. We see a similar embarrassment on the part of the parents of the man born blind in John’s Gospel. They refuse to speak to the authorities about their son:
Ask him; he is of age. He will speak for himself. (John 9:21)
Luke’s account is softer and just focuses on the saying of Jesus. In fact, Luke has taken this passage out of its context in Mark (3:31-35) and turns it into a conclusion to his short section on the parables. In doing so, he modifies Mark’s statement:
Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother. (Mark 3:35)
This is done to match the end of Luke’s parable of the sower:
But as for that [i.e. the seed which fell] in the good soil, these are the ones who, when they hear the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart and bear fruit with endurance. (Luke 8:15)
Luke has Jesus say:
My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it. (Luke 8:21)
To a society which regarded itself as God’s chosen people merely by birth and an external ritual like circumcision, Jesus asserts that belonging to God has little to do with blood or race, but only with the relationship one establishes with God.
There is a lot of meaning in the words of the message:
Your mother and your brothers are standing outside…
It was clear from their behaviour that they were not, like the seed falling on fertile soil, ‘hearing’ him and so they were outsiders. Those who really ‘hear’, no matter who they are or where they come from, are ‘insiders’ and belong to the family of Jesus.
Of course, we know from elsewhere, especially in Luke’s Gospel, that Mary is not being condemned here. In fact, this is where her greatness really lies. Clearly it partly lies in her being chosen to be the mother of God’s Son. But perhaps it lies even more in her saying ‘Yes’ (“…let it be with me according to your word”), in her unswerving faithfulness to that ‘Yes’ and in her standing by her Son to the very end when all the rest had fled.
When, on another occasion, she was indirectly praised for being the mother of such a Son, Jesus had spoken in words very similar to today:
Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it! (Luke 11:28)
Our discipleship, too, is not determined by our being born into a Catholic family or just by being baptised or by observing the external requirements of our religion, but by our total commitment to the gospel and to an unconditional following of Jesus. Only then can we truly be said to be his brother or sister.
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Tuesday of Week 25 of Ordinary Time – First Reading
Commentary on Proverbs 21:1-6,10-13
We have today a set of two-line moral aphorisms which are quite distinct from each other and with which we are not likely to quarrel. However, whether they reflect the way we always behave is another question, so we do need to read or listen to each statement carefully.
Today the writer tells us that everything is ultimately in God’s hands. The heart of the greatest king is just like flowing water in the hands of the Lord. He can direct it where he pleases. Great kings like Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon and Cyrus of Persia might have seemed all-powerful when compared to Israel, but before God they were impotent. They were merely instruments in his hands. Whether we are dealing with the great suffering that Nebuchadnezzar brought on Israel, or the liberations from the Babylonians which came with Cyrus—in either case, for all their apparent power, they were only doing God’s work.
It is not enough for a person’s external behaviour to seem good. God will see and judge the inner intentions of the heart. In the true follower of Christ there is no difference between his outward behaviour and his inward intentions. As Paul writes to the Corinthians:
I am not aware of anything against myself, but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. (1 Cor 4:4)
And in the Letter to the Hebrews we read:
Indeed, the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing until it divides soul from spirit, joints from marrow; it is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. (Heb 4:12)
To act virtuously and in a spirit of true justice towards others pleases God more than any sacrifice.
This is a theme which goes right through the Old Testament, but is put with particular force in the prophets. Says the prophet Hosea, for example:
For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice,
the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings. (Hos 6:6)
And from Micah:
Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams,
with ten thousands of rivers of oil? (Mic 6:7)
And there are powerful words from Jeremiah:
Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat the flesh. For in the day that I brought your ancestors out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to them or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices. But this command I gave them, “Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; walk only in the way that I command you, so that it may be well with you.” (Jer 7:21-23)
The Gospels will continue to emphasise this. For instance, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said:
So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift. (Matt 5:23-24)
For us it means that regular attendance in church and at Mass by itself is not enough unless it is accompanied by a daily life that gives real witness in word and action to the loving demands of the gospel. Arrogance and pride, which result in trampling on the dignity and rights of others, can only be seen as belonging to sin. The ‘hardworking’ man reflects on the value of what he does and is a gainer in the long run. The one who rushes to gain wealth and material success for himself ends up the loser.
Similarly, to make a fortune through lying and deceit is tantamount to seeking death rather than life. As our society becomes more prosperous and people have more, paradoxically the level of dishonesty also grows at all levels of society. Even some who have more than they could possibly spend will commit massive fraud to get even more. We may not be in that league, but we might profitably ask: How honest are we in the use of our material resources?
The mocker ends up being punished by his own arrogance and the dead end he chose to follow. The formerly ignorant can learn from this. The wise person, however, is always ready to learn more from those who can teach him.
Finally, a very serious warning for all of us: if we close our ears to the cry of the poor and the needy, we cannot expect to have our own cries for help responded to either. Again, as our society grows richer, there are still many—far too many—who are shut off from sharing in that prosperity. Ironically, growing prosperity for some all too often exists with growing poverty for others.
In Luke’s Gospel we remember the parable of the rich man and the poor man, Lazarus, whom he totally neglected (Luke 16:19-31). And we know of the unmerciful servant who had a huge debt forgiven by his master, but then had a fellow-servant thrown into jail for not paying back a paltry amount (Matt 18:23-35). And we pray the words:
Forgive us our sins, AS we forgive those who sin against us.
How much of what we have gained over the years has been shared with those who have not gained or even lost? The fact that what they have lost may have been largely through their own mistakes does not lessen their need for help. The term ‘deserving poor’ cannot be found anywhere in the Gospels. As has been said, “God loves the poor, not because they are good, but because they are poor.” Each of these sayings can stand by itself, but together they build up a picture of the kind of person each one of us is called to be.
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Monday of Week 25 of Ordinary Time – Gospel
Commentary on Luke 8:16-18
The message today seems clear enough. The gospel message is not meant to be kept hidden. We are not a ‘mystery religion’ in the sense that the gospel is only for initiates. It is a message that is to be proclaimed from the housetops. If what we believe and say is true, it will prevail.
We understand Jesus to be the Light of the world, and his followers are also to be like lamps shining out for all the world to see. An invisible Christian is a contradiction in terms, yet there are strong tendencies for us to keep our religion to ourselves and not foist it on others.
However, forcing others to believe is not the message being given, even if it were possible. Inviting people to ‘come and see’, to hear the message and have a personal experience of living it, is something else. We also believe that the gospel message offers a way of life that brings great happiness into the lives of individuals and, in fact, to whole societies if it is really followed. So, part of our communicating the message is as much through our lifestyle (“See…it works!”) as through what we say.
Jesus says today:
So pay attention to how you listen…
It is not just listening, but a hearing which understands, accepts, assimilates and puts into practice. What is heard and assimilated has to be passed on. Otherwise it dies, because:
…for to those who have, more will be given, and from those who do not have, even what they seem to have will be taken away.
To be a Christian is not to reach a certain level and stay there. It essentially means constant growth and development—to stay still or to stagnate is to go backwards.
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Saturday of Week 19 of Ordinary Time – Gospel
Commentary on Matthew 19:13-15
This short passage is an echo of the statement Jesus made at the beginning of the discourse on the Church (Matt 18:1-4). Parents were bringing their children for Jesus to bless. The disciples, with the officiousness of minor officials, thought they were doing their Master a favour by protecting him from such trivial nuisances.
Jesus scolds them:
Let the children come to me, and do not stop them, for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.
Thus, not to children alone does the Kingdom of Heaven belong, but to all those who have the qualities of the child: their simplicity and openness, teachability, freedom from prejudice and readiness for change and adaptation. Only such people are ready to hear the message of the Gospel in its fullness.
The passage leads naturally into the next one about the rich man who asked Jesus what he should do to enter eternal life. For all his wealth, he would prove to be wanting in this particular area of openness.
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Saturday of Week 19 of Ordinary Time – First Reading
Commentary on Ezekiel 18:1-10,13,30-32
As stated in the First Reading, there was a saying among the Israelites that the prophet quotes:
The parents have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.
In addition to today’s reading, we can also find the saying in Jeremiah (31:29). The meaning was clear enough—whatever wrongs the ancestors had done, their offspring would pay the penalty. We see that the idea was still prevalent in the time of Jesus. One day as he walked along, Jesus saw a man who had been blind from birth. His disciples asked him:
Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? (John 9:2)
To which Jesus replied:
Neither…(John 9:3)
However, both Jeremiah and Ezekiel (not to mention Jesus) reject the idea. Jeremiah says:
But all shall die for their own sins; the teeth of the one who eats sour grapes shall be set on edge. (Jer 31:30)
While Ezekiel, quoting Yahweh, says:
As I live, says the Lord God, this proverb shall no more be used by you in Israel. Know that all lives are mine; the life of the parent as well as the life of the child is mine: it is only the person who sins who shall die.
In other words, if any people suffered (as the Israelites were suffering under Nebuchadnezzar at this time), the blame could not be put at the door of their parents or grandparents. Everyone is responsible for the effects of their own wrongdoing, then “only the person who sins shall die”.
There then follows a list of actions which can be expected from the virtuous, actions which were constantly violated by the inhabitants of Jerusalem. These violations led eventually to the utter destruction of their city and its Temple and their being either slaughtered or carried away to Babylon in exile.
Among the good things listed are:
- Not eating on the mountains. This referred to performing idolatrous rituals on the shrines in the mountains.
- Not raising their eyes to the pagan idols, which Israel was now worshipping.
- Not having adulterous relations with a neighbour’s wife.
- Not having sexual relations with a woman during her menstruation. (Contact with blood was always forbidden to the Jews.)
- Not oppressing people.
- Giving back a pledge which had been offered when money was paid back after a loan.
- Not committing robbery.
- Feeding the hungry and clothing the naked
- Not lending at interest or demanding extra payment for a loan.
- Judging fairly in a dispute between two people.
- Living by Yahweh’s statutes and observing his ordinances.
Such a person (irrespective of how badly a predecessor behaved) is a good person and will surely live.
On the other hand (again irrespective of how well a predecessor behaved), if a person violates all these things, he shall surely die:
…he shall surely be put to death; his blood shall be upon himself.
The reading concludes by Yahweh’s saying that he will judge:
…all of you according to your ways…
We are then urged to turn away from and be converted from all wrongdoing, and there will be no reason to find a person guilty in any way.
…get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit!…For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, says the Lord God. Turn, then, and live.
Perhaps we do not exactly think like the Israelites of those days did, but how many times have we been guilty of laying the blame for things we did on other people—”you made me do it!” There is in our society a strong tendency to find scapegoats, or to concentrate certain areas of wrongdoing on one or a small group of people.
Today’s reading reminds us that we are wholly responsible for the guilt of our wrongdoing, but at the same time let us hear again those words of the Lord in today’s reading:
I have no pleasure in the death of anyone…
And Jesus told us:
I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.
(John 10:10)
Let us open ourselves to receiving that life.
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Thursday of Week 19 of Ordinary Time – Gospel
Commentary on Matthew 18:21—19:1
The last part of Matthew‘s discourse on the church is about forgiveness. This is not unconnected with the previous section on excommunicating the unrepentant brother or sister. As soon as a brother or sister does repent, there must be forgiveness—not just once, but indefinitely—”seventy-seven times”.
The reason is given in the parable which Jesus speaks about the two servants in debt. The one who had a huge debt to the king was forgiven, but then refused to forgive a relatively trivial debt owed to him by a fellow servant. Understand that ten thousand talents then would be the equivalent of hundreds of millions in a major currency today, and the 300 denarii would have been the equivalent of about three months’ wages.
In the Gospel, the ones with the big debt to the king are clearly ourselves; the ones with the small debts to us are our brothers and sisters.
We do not expect God to forgive us once or twice or any limited number of times, but every time. It is nowhere written that we have, say, only ten chances of going to confession and, once our quota is used up, there is nothing left. But if that is true of our relationship with God, it also has to be true in our relationships with others. We can never refuse an offer of reconciliation. And, we might add, forgiveness is much easier to fully complete when reconciliation has taken place.
This is not at all the same as turning a blind eye to wrongdoing. Yesterday’s text made that very clear. We are talking about healing divisions between people; we must never put obstacles in the way of that.
We have now come to the end of this discourse indicated by the first sentence of chapter 19:
When Jesus had finished saying these things, he left Galilee and went to the region of Judea beyond the Jordan.
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Thursday of Week 19 of Ordinary Time – First Reading
Commentary on Ezekiel 12:1-12
Ezekiel is instructed by God to go through an elaborate mime as a message to his people so as to warn them of the coming deportation of the people of Jerusalem into exile in Babylon. The people are described by God as rebels, as people who have eyes, but do not see, have ears, but do not hear—because they do not want to. Jesus will use similar terms in speaking of the people who refused to listen to him. He will quote from Isaiah, who received these instructions from Yahweh when he was being called as a prophet:
Go and say to this people:
‘Keep listening, but do not comprehend;
keep looking, but do not understand.’
Make the mind of this people dull,
and stop their ears,
and shut their eyes,
so that they may not look with their eyes
and listen with their ears
and comprehend with their minds
and turn and be healed.
(Isaiah 6:9-10; see also Matt 13:14-15)
Ezekiel is told to pack up all his things like a person leaving home and going off into distant exile. Maybe when the people see him doing this its meaning will begin to dawn on them and they will realise that it is pointing to their rebellious behaviour.
The packing is to be done by day in the sight of all, but then he is to slip out in the evening, i.e. in such a way that he is seen as leaving covertly. He is to leave in darkness, through a hole in the mud wall of his house. His face is to be covered so that he cannot see the countryside which he is entering. All this is to make Ezekiel, the Lord’s prophet, a symbol or sign for what is going to happen to Israel.
Ezekiel did everything just as the Lord had commanded in full sight of the people. (We need to remember that he was a prophet and people would wonder about the significance of his rather strange actions.)
The following morning God again spoke to Ezekiel. When the people ask the prophet what is the meaning of what he is doing, they are to be told that the oracle (the mime is understood as having a message from God) is directed against the people of Jerusalem and the whole of Israel everywhere.
The meaning of Ezekiel’s mime is then clearly spelt out. The people will go into exile and banishment and King Zedekiah (“the prince who is among them”) will carry his own belongings and go through a hole in the city wall; his face will be covered so that he will not be able to see the country.
In fact, Nebuchadnezzar will come and destroy Jerusalem and the people will be brought off into exile to Babylon. During the siege of the city, King Zedekiah and his army will try to escape through a breach in the city walls. But he was captured by the Babylonians and brought to Riblah. There his two sons were killed in his presence and then his eyes were put out before he was brought off to Babylon (see 2 Kings 25). The king’s blindness is a symbol of the blindness of the whole people.
In the Gospel Jesus frequently is seen healing the blind (those who cannot see) and the deaf (those who cannot hear) and the mute (those who cannot speak). These are afflictions all of us can suffer from, and they prevent us from knowing and carrying out what God wants in our lives. Let us ask today for healing and docility to God’s will for us:
Lord, let me see… (Luke 18:41)
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Wednesday of Week 19 of Ordinary Time – Gospel
Commentary on Matthew 18:15-20
Today’s part of the ‘Discourse on the Church’ shifts from the harm that we can do to others, to the harm that others can do to the community, and how the community and its members should respond. Clearly we are speaking here of some serious wrong which hurts the mission of the Church community.
The wrongdoer is to be tackled on three levels, and this reflects what has just gone before about bringing back the sheep which is lost. Reconciliation, not punishment, is the objective.
If the wrong directly affects one person, then that person or another should go along to the wrongdoer privately and try to help the individual change their ways. If this works, then that is the end of the matter. However, if the wrongdoer will not listen, then one or two others who are also aware of the wrongdoing should be brought along as corroboration. This is based on a passage from Deuteronomy:
A single witness shall not suffice to convict a person of any crime or wrongdoing in connection with any offense that may be committed. Only on the evidence of two or three witnesses shall a charge be sustained. (Deut 19:15)
If the wrongdoer remains obstinate in the face of this evidence, then the whole community is to be brought in. And if in the face of the whole community, there is still no sign of repentance, then the person is to be expelled and treated like a “gentile and a tax collector”, in other words, as a total outsider. The tax collectors were among the most despised people in the community. They were local people employed by Roman tax contractors to collect taxes for them. Because they worked for Rome and often demanded unreasonable payments (they had to make a profit!), they gained a bad reputation and were generally hated and considered traitors to their own people and their religion.
The word Matthew uses for ‘community’ here is ‘church’, ekklesia or, in Hebrew, qahal, which refers to the gathering of a Christian community. As mentioned earlier, this is only one of two places where this term is used in the Gospels (the other is Matt 16:18).
Jesus now goes further in saying that all such decisions by the community have God’s full endorsement:
…whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven. [i.e. by God]
Jesus also tells them:
…if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.
This mandate seems to be given to the community as a whole and not just to specific individuals.
It would be worth our while going carefully through this text and seeing how it applies to our church situation today. To what extent do we feel responsible for the wrongdoings of our fellow-Christians? To what extent do we realise that our behaviour, both as individuals and groups, reflects on the overall witness that the Church is called to give as the Body of Christ? Do people clearly see the message of the Gospel from the way we live both individually and corporately?
While, on the one hand, we are told to be compassionate and non-judgmental, are we over-tolerant of people in the community who believe that anything they do is just their own business? Every Christian community has a solemn responsibility to give witness to the vision of life that Jesus gave to us. There have then to be standards of behaviour which bind all. Moments of weakness can be and should be treated with compassion, but deliberate and continued flouting of our central commitment to truth, love, justice and other foundational principles cannot be overlooked or allowed to undermine the central mission of the Christian community to be a sacrament of the Kingdom. It is not a question of image, but of our integrity.
What has all this to do with the way we use the sacrament of reconciliation, and what is the relationship of the sacrament to this passage? The passage is closely linked with what Jesus says about the problem of giving scandal, of being a stumbling block in people’s coming to Christ. At the same time, as tomorrow’s passage will indicate, the long-term aim—above all—is not punishment, but reconciliation and healing of divisions.
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