| Readings: | Exodus 17:8-13 2 Timothy 3:14-4:2 Luke 18:1-8 |
| Date: | October 19, 2025 - Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C |
"I shall deliver a just decision for her lest she finally come and strike me"
That is one of my favorite gospel verse translations. Colloquially the original Greek phrase means "come and punch me in the nose".
One of the commentators I read preparing for today's readings said that over the years, when this was the gospel at Mass, he imagined preachers all around the world overwhelmingly comparing the judge to God and the widow to us as a model to follow. In his opinion there were just too many differences between the description of the judge in this parable and Jesus description of the Father for him to understand that. And I agree. In Matthew, Jesus tells us not to babble on in our prayers as the Gentiles do because your Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask him. Or again from Matthew: Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your Heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? I suggest that Jesus, as he often does, is using exaggeration to make his point, which might be very different from what you think.
So if Jesus' point is not that we have to keep badgering God to answer our prayers, what is he saying? Again, this commentator said what if we reversed the usual roles in this parable. In other words what if the widow represents God and the judge represents us? That might put a whole different understanding on the table here, wouldn't it? What if the type of prayer that Jesus is calling us to is not unceasing prayer of petition but rather unceasing prayer of listening to what God, who knows what is just and right, is calling us to do? He ends the parable with that question: "but when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?" As Fr. Jeff reminded us a few weeks ago in his homily, faith in God is not just thinking something in our minds but it is putting our trust, indeed our whole lives, into God's hands. Putting ourselves in God's hands is not a passive act; it is not just stepping back and leaving God to do everything. It is actively listening to God to discern God's plan for us, and then putting that plan into action.
Our first reading from the book of Exodus makes this point. Why does Moses need to keep his hands up in order for God to accomplish the defeat of Amalek? Couldn't God do this all by God's self? There is an old adage in theology that says: without God, humans can do nothing; without humans, God chooses to do nothing." God has chosen the human race to be the sole instrument of God's plan to bring salvation to our world. While that applies to everyone, it applies in a special way to those of us who are baptized. And so we are to continue strengthening our baptismal commitments by celebrating Eucharist week after week, and by developing a prayer life that centers on listening to God speak to us. Like the widow in today's parable, God continues to speak to us of the injustices all around us, and to call on us to render a just decision for God by caring for the poor and the marginalized, taking care of the sick, by calling out social injustice when we see it, and by sharing the blessings we have been given with those less fortunate.
Let us follow the practical wisdom of the judge in today's parable and render a just decision for God, lest God come and punch us in the nose!