Matthew's Conversion - And Ours

          Saturday’s Gospel https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/011726.cfm is about the call of St. Matthew, the tax collector, to be an Apostle.  It fits at this point in the Church’s liturgical year for two reasons.  First, all this week we have been reading Mark’s Gospel, which is focused on repentance and conversion from sin, man’s fundamental ailment.  Second, the start of Ordinary Time also focuses on the start of the Church, which begins with the call of the Apostles.  Tuesday’s Gospel featured the calls of Peter, Andrew, James, and John.  Today – after three days of focus on healing and its relationship to sin and salvation – we find Jesus calling Matthew (Levi) the tax collector.

          It’s not accidental to the trajectory of Mark’s Gospel.  In the ancient world, tax collectors were considered public sinners for a variety of reasons.  If they worked for Rome, they were part of the hated occupation.  But the method of collecting taxes in antiquity was such that it was prone to abuse.  Tax collectors often included a personal markup and might play favorites.  That was nice if you were a favorite, less so if you were disfavored.  So, while some roles (like pimp) might be inherently immoral, the general ethos in which tax collectors worked did not result in their being considered paragons of morality.

          Jesus comes to Matthew (Levi), looks him in the eye, and invites him to “follow me.”  Matthew does.

          But he apparently decides also to have a kind of going-away party and, if you are a tax collector, you probably going to have “professional colleagues” on your invitation list.  Jesus goes to this party, to the scandal of Pharisees who question his associations.  Jesus recognizes their hypocrisy and reminds them “those who are well do not need a physician, the sick do.”  After a week of healings – exorcisms and physical healings – this theme fits in well.

          There’s much controversy in today’s Church about the notion of “accompaniment.”  Some – including me – have been critics of this focus.  But we are all sinners.  Are we like Pharisees? 

          I would say no.  Jesus is making it clear that He accompanies people like Matthew and tax collectors and women caught in adultery because “the sick” need healing.  But He doesn’t mince words that they are sick and need to be healed, especially from their sins.  If I heard the same focus in “accompaniment” talk, I’d say “no problem.”  We are all sinners and all need to be accompanied.  But when I don’t hear that focus – when I hear accompaniment without the simultaneous call to conversion, when I hear full-throated openness to lifestyles accompanied by muffled moral challenge – well, that does not sound like what Jesus talked about.  It instead sounds like moral relativism with a dash of holy water and a puff of incense to make the secular seem holy.

          Jesus invites, but not unconditionally.  The conditions were prescribed in Monday’s Gospel: “repent and believe the Gospel.”  Repenting means recognizing sin and one’s immersion in it.  Believing the Gospel means living the Gospel as the Christian community has lived and understood it – not as one might like to rewrite it to “accompany” one’s caricature of the Gospel message.  The same Jesus who spoke of love makes clear that “if you love me, you will keep my commandments” (Jn 14:15).

          The Church has to accompany sinful men because – with the exception of two human beings – it’s the only kind we’ve got.  But, as this week’s weekday Mass readings makes clear, the divine Will to be with us and to heal us presupposes consciousness of what we need to be healed from.  Conversion starts with the confession of sin.  And the groundwork for that is not laid by dissembling about it.