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Reflection by Jim Quillinan, Author of Along the Track
A couple of weeks ago while I was waiting for a train at Flinders Street, the man next to me asked if I’d mind if he had a cigarette. I said to him that he was running a risk as smoking wasn’t permitted here. Well, he needed one and he’d take the risk. He was trying to give them up but with little success, he told me. I said to him that I hadn’t had one for over fifty years, so we chatted about smoking, when we started, why and so on. He asked a man nearby by for a dollar so he could buy a dim sim like he was eating. The bloke gave his last one to him, so in return he offered his donor a drink from his water bottle. A simple little encounter but it reminded me of today’s Gospel message.
The three readings today at first appear to be very uncompromising and in a sense they are. They are about humility, about being honest with ourselves, acknowledging our faults, our limitations and our need to work on them, and that is never easy. As the psalm says: don’t let presumption rule me. In other words, don’t kid yourself! The culture we live in doesn’t encourage such honesty. The readings are about admitting that each of us is a sinner, not a popular word these days, but such an admission is a crucial step in our growth, no matter what age we may be.
Today’s Gospel adds a further perspective. As Jesus said in other places, the Kingdom is close at hand. It is here, it is now. It is a work in progress, just like each of us is a work in progress. The Gospel is not about the afterlife but what we are doing to bring about the kingdom in the here and now, within ourselves and in our communities. Sometimes, like the smoker at Flinders Street station, that can be a lifetime journey with ups and downs, successes and failures, but working at it is the important part. We don’t overcome limitations and failures in one hit, we don’t reach perfection in one go. Sometimes we have to be honest and say that we need forgiveness, that there are times that we have to make a radical change, to work at getting rid of the things that lead us astray.
The first step may be seeking forgiveness, admitting that we have done wrong, that we have sinned and, perhaps more importantly, that we are not always right. It means being open to forgiveness from those we may have offended or wronged in what we have done and what we have failed to do. It also means that we recognise that we have to work at overcoming the things that keep us from the Kingdom, our faults, our prejudices and sometimes our views that we have to admit may be wrong headed. They are never easy to give up.
The psalm offers us encouragement in this journey, how trust in God and God’s grace within ourselves can revive the soul and bring joy to the heart.
