A Homily for the Third Sunday of Lent
Saturday, April 5, 2025
Prince of Peace Catholic Church – 4:00 Mass
Isaiah 43:16-21; Psalm 126:1-2, 2-3, 4-5, 6; Philippians 3:8-14; John 8:1-11
This week’s Gospel tells of an encounter between Jesus, some Pharisees, and a woman caught in adultery. We see here a stark contrast between two voices: the voice of the devil – the “accuser of the brethren” — through the mouths of the Pharisees, and the voice of God – the lover of humanity and of each person individually — spoken through the mouth of Jesus.
There’s something fishy about this whole situation from the start. The Pharisees have been looking for a way to attack Jesus. They’ve been scandalized by his readiness to mix with “prostitutes, tax collectors, and sinners.” Their hidden goal is to trap Jesus into breaking the Mosaic Law and thereby discredit him as a true teacher of God’s ways.
So they bring a woman “caught in the very act” of committing adultery, testing his compassion for sinners, thinking they will force him into a situation that will compromise him no matter what he does.
Two details of this accusation sure make it look like a set up. First, it isn’t easy to find people in the act of committing adultery just when you might happen to need them. Where did the Pharisees come up with this woman?
And second, the Law prescribed that BOTH the man and the woman caught in adultery should be punished. But where is the man here? It begins to appear as though the Pharisees laid a trap for the woman, possibly convincing some man to lure her at a particular time and place where they could catch her, and then letting the man go free, maybe even paying him for his nefarious deed.
When Jesus makes his comment about “the one among you who is without sin,” he probably means: “the one who is without sin in this specific matter.” He’s calling out their deceit and their malice in attempting to trap both this woman and himself.
We’re told that Jesus then bends down and begins to write on the ground with his finger. The meaning of this nonverbal response to the Pharisees’ accusations against the adulteress is unclear. Some believe Jesus was writing the sins of those who were accusing the woman, although It could have simply been a sign of indifference, showing that he refused to be drawn into this trap.
After writing on the ground, Jesus straightens up and says, “Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” According to the Law, the witnesses who testify to the guilt of an accused person in a capital case are the ones who begin the execution.
After hearing Jesus’ words, the woman’s accusers went away one by one, beginning with the elders. Their motives in leaving aren’t clear. Perhaps they realize that their plan to entrap Jesus has failed. Or perhaps Jesus’ words written on the ground touched their hearts and they recognized their own sinfulness. After they all departed, we’re told that Jesus was alone with the woman before him.
Jesus addresses her and calls attention to the fact that all her accusers are gone. She acknowledges that no one is left to condemn her, and Jesus replies, Neither do I condemn you. Just as he did to the formerly paralyzed man earlier in John’s gospel, Jesus tells her to change her ways: Go, [and] from now on do not sin any more. Jesus offers this woman a fresh start if she turns away from her sins and opens herself to God’s infinite mercy. And, thanks be to God, this is exactly how he deals with each of us.
Like the Pharisees in today’s gospel, the voice of the devil seeks to accuse and condemn us when we sin. He knows how destructive an accusing voice can be to a guilty person. He wants to rub our noses in our sins so that we lose hope and enter into despair. The devil’s accusations are often false or exaggerated, but even when they are true, they always come laced with hatred and despair. His accusatory voice brings discouragement and darkness. He wants us to hate ourselves as much as he hates us.
God also speaks to us when we sin, but he does so in a different voice in order to heal us. He is the Lord of life, and he calls us to change our ways so that we can have that life to the full. When God’s voice corrects us and shows us our sins, it carries with it hope and the courage to change. In the face of our sins God tells us: “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and do not sin any more.”
Much of our growth in the spiritual life involves learning to listen to the voice of Jesus in our sinfulness, and closing our ears to the accusatory voice of the devil. When we sin, the tempter is the first to accuse us, isn’t he? Our response to his accusations should not be to try to justify our sin, but to flee immediately to the only doctor who can heal us and restore us to life. We MUST RUN to our Savior as quickly as possible for healing and restoration in the Sacrament of Reconciliation. There we will find mercy and forgiveness, not condemnation.
There is another aspect to this conflict between the two voices that speak to us in our sinfulness. While they originate outside of us, they take root in us, and each of us participates in imitating and speaking in the tones of one or the other of these voices. When we address the sin or injustice of those around us, we can either join Jesus as he hopes for life and calls us to repentance, or we can join Satan as he accuses in order to harm and destroy.
Given our highly accusatory society, we should pay special attention to this. We live in a world of constant accusations, that even when true they are hurled as thunderbolts to attack and destroy those who WE have deemed worthy of our hatred and dismissiveness.
There is a perilous temptation for all of us in this. We fallen human beings have a sad readiness to find scapegoats. We feel less of our own guilt when we self-righteously point out the sins of others. We can quickly forget that every accusation involves one guilty party accusing another guilty party. Every one of us is a sinner! We are all guilty of some sort of sin.
We might say to ourselves, “For heaven’s sake, I would NEVER become involved in that kind of awful behavior!” While this may be true; my sins, although different, are no less ugly in God’s eyes. Remember what Jesus said about taking the plank out of your own eye before removing the splinter from your brother’s eye?
As we near the conclusion of this Lenten season, let us ask the Holy Spirit to show us if there are ways that we’ve been buying into, and speaking with, the accusatory death-dealing voice of the evil one, rather than with the corrective life-giving voice of Jesus to any of those around us: our family members, our friends, our co-workers, members of another political party, government leaders, members of the Church, or members of the wider society.
Let us be reluctant to join in gleeful accusations against our fellow man, and instead try to speak with Christ’s voice, especially to our enemies. Let us be ever grateful for and responsive to the overflowing generosity and love of our Heavenly Father, who sent his Son to save us and gently speak to us when we fall into sin. Let us think with the mind of Christ, not with the mind of the evil one. Let us be merciful to our fellow sinners.