Fifth Sunday of Lent 4/2

This Sunday’s Gospel allows us to be present at an incredible encounter between two people: Jesus and a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery. Last week, Jesus revealed to us the heart of the Father, who runs out to embrace the return of the prodigal son. This week, it is Jesus himself who shows us the heart of God, whose love looks to touch the sinner. St. Augustine uses the phrase, “Misericordia et misera,” to refer to this encounter. After the Pharisees went away one by one, the two of them remained alone: “mercy with misery.”

Let us place ourselves in this scene. Have you ever experienced shame or guilt? Have you ever felt judged, outcast, perhaps even unloved or unwanted. Place yourself before the Lord, and hear the words that he wants to say to you: “Patrick, neither do I condemn you.”

It’s another expression of the same love of the Father, who wants to come out to embrace you. You are his son or his daughter, and nothing can change the way he looks at you with love. Pope Francis dedicated an entire year to mercy, and he wrote an Apostolic Letter, called “Misericordia et misera,” in which he refers to this encounter. “This Gospel account is not an encounter of sin and judgement in the abstract, but of a sinner and her Savior. Jesus looked that woman in the eye and read in her heart a desire to be understood, forgiven and set free. The misery of sin was clothed with the mercy of love.”

Likely if you are like me, you too desire to not be in the situation of the adulteress. Ultimately, none of us wants to be the “miserable one.” But truly each of us is “misery in need of mercy.” We are the adulteress woman, even if we think like the Pharisees, that we are in no need of a medic. Being poor and miserable doesn’t take away how incredibly beautiful each one of us is. But our glory comes from being loved by God: both his loving us into existence, and his merciful love that forgives us and restores us to new life.

Let us allow God to love us, and let us learn to love ourselves and others in the same way. Let us learn to embrace ourselves and say the words that God says over us: “Neither do I condemn you.” And let us learn to say these words to others in our relationships: “Neither do I condemn you.”