Sunday of the Publican and Pharisee

I’m sure we all know, or have known, people who need to be right.  They will argue and cajole and do everything to convince you that they are right.  Religious fanatics, like political fanatics, like sports fanatics and all of types of fanatics will stop at nothing to convince you that their faith, or their political party, or their opinion is RIGHT! 

But Fr. Meletios Webber in his wonderful book Bread and Water: Wine and Oil reminds us that Jesus never told us we had to be right, He told us we had to be righteous.  There is, however, one type of righteousness which isn’t right: self-righteousness.  Self-righteous people are convinced both that they are both right and righteous as well.  Even when they’re not.

In today’s parable Jesus presents us with a classic example of self-righteousness in the person of the Pharisee.  The Pharisee feels he is justified because he fulfills all the outward requirements of his faith (prayer, fasting, almsgiving, worship, etc.).  On the other hand Jesus tells us that the Publican, a tax collector, a traitor to his own people as he is not only collecting taxes, but collecting taxes for the Roman occupiers and probably lining his own pockets as well, is justified.  Why?  Because of his deep compunction and repentance.

Hearing this parable it would be easy to come to one of two incorrect conclusions.  We might misunderstand Jesus to be saying that fulfilling the precepts of God’s Law – fasting, praying, and worshiping - is not necessary.  Or we might misunderstand Jesus to be saying that all we need to do is to feel compunctionate, or remorseful, or repentant, and everything is fine.  As we know, however, both are necessary. In today’s parable Jesus is teaching us that we need balance in our spiritual life.

In chapter 23 of St. Matthew’s Gospel Jesus says: “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone.”  What does this tell us?

The “works of the law”, our “religious” or “spiritual” activities (prayer, fasting, acts of mercy, worship, scripture reading, morality, participation in the holy mysteries, etc.) are important and necessary.  But if we do them with pride, rather than with humility, they are not God-pleasing, and can lead us away from, rather than towards God.  The problem of the Pharisee is not that he prays, and fasts, and tithes, but that he sees in these acts his worth before God (as if God needs anything from any one of us!). 

On the other hand the Publican feels genuine remorse and repentance, but if his feelings of repentance do not lead him to acts of repentance – to love of neighbour, love of God, prayer, fasting, tithing, worship, etc. – he is in no better shape than the Pharisee.

Balance is important in every aspect of our life.  If I don’t maintain my physical balance I might fall over and hurt myself.  The same thing happens in our spiritual life.  Both acts and feelings are important, and they work together, they inform each other.  Jesus is reminding us that in our spiritual life it’s important to maintain a healthy balance between our acts and our feelings.

If we possess a well-formed Christian conscience our feelings will be a useful guide to how we should act and react in any given situation, but if they don’t result in God-pleasing words and deeds our feelings can be as great an obstacle to our spiritual development as the “religious” behaviour of the pharisee was to him.

Everything we do begins with our thoughts.  Cultivation of a healthy conscience is fundamental.  How do we cultivate a healthy conscience?  Through prayer, reading of scripture and spiritual literature, listening to the saints and the holy people around us, and also by reflecting upon our deeds.  How does our conscience direct our acts? By making us uncomfortable when we think about or perform acts which result in psychological or emotional disturbance, spiritual disquiet, or interpersonal antagonism and conflict.

Balance is important in every aspect of our life.  A paradoxical aspect of today’s parable is that in order to live a truly balanced spiritual life it will be necessary for many of us to become more repentant like the publican, and for others to concentrate more on the “externals” of our faith like the pharisee. In the persons of the Publican and Pharisee we observe two important and necessary sides of the spiritual life. Yes, our external actions, our words and deeds, are important.  And yes, keeping watch over our thoughts and cultivating a spirit of repentance is necessary as well.  Let us remember that in the final analysis we shouldn’t be terribly concerned about being “right,” but very concerned about being righteous.

Fr. Bohdan Hladio
9 February 2025