Homily for Fifth Sunday of Lent – 3 April 2022

MISERY AND MERCY

After Jesus had written in the sand with his finger and challenged the Pharisees that the one without sin should throw the first stone at the woman; and after they had all gone away, one by one, St Augustine, in his beautiful commentary on this Gospel text, says that only two remained: misery and mercy. Misery and Mercy: it is these two words which sum up the meaning of today’s Gospel, the whole of the Christian message, and indeed much of the Christian life.

We see that the mercy of Jesus is contrasted with the self-righteousness and heartlessness of the Pharisees. The woman is placed in the midst of them, the place of judgement and humiliation. We can just imagine the shame and fear she would have felt. The cruelty of this episode is that the Pharisees were using this poor woman to trap and attack Jesus. They were not as concerned about her or even her sin. They were prepared to use her, and even execute her, just to find a way to destroy Jesus.

The trap that the Pharisees set for Jesus was a clever one. There was a Jewish law that said that those who were caught in adultery should be stoned to death. However, the Romans would not allow the Jews to put anyone to death. Therefore, if Jesus said that the woman should be stoned, not only would he be an accomplice in a heartless, barbaric act, but his accusers could denounce him to the Romans as challenging the authority of Rome. On the other hand, if Jesus said that the woman should not be stoned, then his accusers could say that he violated the Law of Moses and promoted immorality among the people.

STAND IN THE NEED OF GOD’S MERCY AND COMPASSION

It is interesting that this Gospel account only appears in one of the ancient manuscripts on which our modern translation of the Bible is based. But this precious written account of mercy was preserved and eventually made its way into the Bible. Over the centuries it was placed in different Gospels and in different places in the Gospels, mainly in Luke and John. As we have it today, it is in John’s Gospel, chapter 8, but almost certainly the style of Greek and the style of the writing means that it was more probably originally written by Luke.

The complicated history of this passage is because some early Christians were worried about this Gospel account. In their mind, Jesus in this story, is being soft on sin, and particularly on sexual sin. But of course, this is not true. Jesus’ mercy and compassion should not be understood as being soft on sin. He clearly tells the woman to sin no more. He does not condone her sin or make excuses for it. But he does show mercy.

Various suggestions have been made over the centuries about what Jesus wrote in the sand. The most common suggestion is that he wrote the sins of the woman’s accusers. He might have written the verse from Ezekiel (16:36-40) in which God accuses unfaithful Israel of adultery. What about the man caught in adultery? Why wasn’t he presented for stoning too? Was he perhaps a member of the Pharisees or one of their family or friends? Where is the justice in that? Perhaps this is what Jesus wrote in the sand, among other things.

THERE IS A HOPE IN THIS FOR US

We need to enter into the drama of this Gospel story. At times we are the woman caught in adultery in terms of our own unfaithfulness to God. At times we might be more identified with the self-righteous Pharisees who judge this woman without mercy and use her for their own ends. What would Jesus write in the sand for each of us, to show how much we need God’s forgiveness ourselves, and therefore must be compassionate to others?

We really don't know anything else about this woman. We only know for sure that Jesus forgives her and tells her to sin no more. Some traditions in the Church say that the woman was Mary Magdalene. Another tradition says that the woman caught in adultery was Mary of Bethany, the sister of Lazarus and Martha. Perhaps this woman is the one who washed Jesus’ feet with her tears and dried them with her hair in the house of the Simon the Pharisee. Of her, Jesus said that her many sins were forgiven because she had loved much. Perhaps these women are the same person. One thing is for sure: all four gospels put Mary Magdalene at the foot of the Cross on Good Friday and at the tomb of Jesus on Easter Sunday as the first witness of the Resurrection.

Is it possible that his woman caught in adultery was the first to experience the resurrection of Jesus? Was her life so transformed by the mercy of Jesus, that she became one of his closest disciples? Is it possible that this is why, when just about all his disciples abandoned him in his most terrible hour, she stood there at the foot of the cross with Mary the Mother of Jesus and John the Beloved Disciple? It seems so very possible, because love, mercy and forgiveness have the power to transform darkness into light, sinners into saints. Remember the saying, ‘Every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future.’

In both the first reading from the Prophet Isaiah and the second reading from St Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, this possibility of leaving the past behind and looking to the future, is promised. In the first reading, God says, ‘Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old; behold I am doing a new thing.’ In the Letter to the Philippians, St Paul writes, “… one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on towards the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” There is hope in this for us. Each of us has the possibility of receiving mercy, of forgiveness for the sins of our past.

The woman represents each one of us in the kind of misery that we are capable of experiencing because of sin. Her life might be snapshot of our own lives. Consider the shame and humiliation she felt. How could this be happening to her? In her person we see human misery. On so many levels, each of us can, in all honesty, admit that we have this same capacity for sin and the misery that follows.

If that were the end of the story, we would just give up and despair. What hopeless creatures we would be if we were just stuck in our misery! But the answer to our capacity for misery, is the mercy of God. The Gospel is that God responds to our weakness and woundedness with compassion and mercy. Jesus doesn’t condemn this woman before him; he forgives her, he shows her mercy. He tells her to sin no more, but he acts with compassion. He meets her misery with mercy.

We can and should all identify with the woman caught in adultery, in terms of our need of forgiveness. We all stand in need of God’s mercy and compassion, at some times more than others, so let us be free in applying this same mercy and compassion to others. Only when we have recognised ourselves in this woman, only when we are honest about the misery that our sin has brought upon us, can we experience the mercy of Jesus. Then we will be able to say with St Paul in the second reading from the Letter to the Philippians, “I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.’