Gospel for Sunday, April 06: V Sunday of Lent Year C – John 8:1-11
1 Then Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. 2 Early in the morning he came again to the temple, and all the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. 3 Then the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman caught in adultery; and when they had set her in the midst, 4 they said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in adultery, in the very act. 5 Now in the law Moses commanded us to stone such women. What do you say?” 6 They said this to test him, so that they might have something to accuse him of. But Jesus stooped down and wrote on the ground with his finger. 7 When they continued asking him, he lifted up his head and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 And again he stooped down and wrote on the ground. 9 But when they heard it, they went out one by one, beginning with the eldest, even to the last.
Jesus alone was left, with the woman standing there. 10 Then Jesus straightened up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and sin no more.”Jh 8:1-11
Dear sisters and brothers of Misericordia, I am Carlo Miglietta, a doctor, biblical scholar, layman, husband, father and grandfather (www.buonabibbiaatutti.it). Also today I share with you a short thought meditation on the Gospel, with special reference to the theme of mercy.
The Gospel of Mercy
Jesus’ message is only an announcement of liberation, of joy: it is truly an unheard-of Gospel. Jesus comes only to save the world: “The Father judges no one, but has given all judgment to the Son” (Jn 5:22). But “God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through him” (Jn 3:17); “The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost” (Lk 19:10).
“It is therefore in both Jewish and Christian tradition to proclaim that God’s mercy is infinite, that God condemns sin, the evil committed, but does not want either the death or the condemnation of the sinner. Even Jesus of Nazareth – according to a Gospel passage that we now find in chapter 8 of the Gospel of John, but which in the ancient Church struggled to find a certain and documented placement, due to the scandalous message it contained – faced with a woman caught in the act of adultery, said: <<Woman, has no one condemned you? Neither do I condemn you! Go and sin no more!>> (Jn 8:10-11). It is in fidelity to this <<good news>> that Pope John, in the encyclical Pacem in terris fifty years ago, affirmed that one must <<never confuse error with the errant>> and that <<the errant is always and first of all a human being and retains, in any case, his dignity as a person>> and must therefore be treated with mercy and compassion” (E. Bianchi).
The Messiah of the excluded
There is no poor person or sinner who is not reached by the Gospel of Jesus. The excluded, the last, are the privileged recipients of his message. At the birth of Jesus, the angels proclaim: “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy, which will be for all the people: today in the city of David a Savior has been born to you, who is Christ the Lord” (Lk 2:10-11). And they announce it not to the priests or scribes, in the sanctity of the Temple, but to poor shepherds, considered impure, because of their coexistence with animals, and considered dishonest, because of their continuous violations of territorial boundaries in search of pastures for their livestock.
In his public life, Jesus is the “friend of tax collectors and sinners” (Mt 11:19), and he is not afraid to upset the right-thinking people by even sitting at the table of these outcasts: and eating together was for the Jews a sign of maximum intimacy. The scribes of the Pharisees were therefore scandalized and “said to his disciples, ‘Why does he eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?’” When Jesus heard this, he said to them, ‘Those who are healthy have no need of a doctor, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners’” (Mk 2:16-17).
The Law required: “If a man commits adultery with his neighbor’s wife, the adulterer and the adulteress shall be put to death” (Lv 20:10). Jesus, however, as we have seen, welcomes the adulteress, forgiving her and sending her away in peace.
The Bible says that one should not have relations with the Samaritans, who were considered outside the communion of Israel because they were racially hybrid and often had a syncretistic cult, which combined the worship of the God of Israel with that of other divinities. But Jesus also goes to Samaria to announce the Kingdom of God, even though he is rejected by the Samaritans because he is going to Jerusalem, while they worship God on Mount Gerizim. And another time he stops to speak with a Samaritan woman to announce to her, at Jacob’s well, the Kingdom of God.
The sick and pagans could not enter the Temple: “<<As for the blind and the lame, they are hated by David>>. That is why they say: <<The blind and the lame shall not enter the house>>” (2 Sam 5:8). At the end of the episode of the expulsion of the sellers from the temple, Matthew notes: “The blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them” (Mt 21:14): in Jesus no one is marginalized anymore: everyone is now admitted into the house of God.
Jesus lets himself be touched by “a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years”, even though the Law forbade it, he does not refuse the affectionate gestures of a sinner, arousing the indignation of right-thinking people, he touches the lepers to heal them, breaking the legal segregation to which they were forced, making them rise from their social death… His mercy reaches everyone!
Forgiveness and new life
“Mercy and goodness, biblically, are not fleeting or moral feelings but, referring to the maternal womb / uterus, they highlight the nature of God and, in the New Testament, reveal that Jesus is the revelation of God’s mercy, not as a fleeting feeling, but as an anticipation of the life that he will give with his death. When one is seized by the mercy of God, one bursts with life to overflow and the person, like a woman giving birth, springs forth life with the life of another (son). This is the scandal of the God of Jesus Christ: the compassion / mercy of God makes one reborn to new life” (A. Ponso).
Jesus “does not limit himself to erasing evil, but regenerates the person to a new life as if reborn again. This is clear in the episode of the adulteress narrated in the Gospel of John: <<Woman… has no one condemned you? No one, Lord… Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more>> (Jn 8:10-11). In Jesus’ <<forgiveness>> of the woman, an act of liberation is highlighted which is the starting point for the new life of a person destined to death by stoning by those who had abused her” (P. Farinella). As Paul says: “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation. For God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not counting men’s trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation… We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake God made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:17-21).
Happy Mercy to all!
Anyone who would like to read a more complete exegesis of the text, or some insights, please ask me at migliettacarlo@gmail.com.