The Pharisee and the Publican

By Fr. Conor Donnelly

(Proofread)

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence. I ask your pardon for my sins and grace to make this time of prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

Jesus spoke the following parable to some people who prided themselves on being upright and despised everyone else. “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee, the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood there and said this prayer to himself, ‘I thank you, God, that I am not grasping, unjust, adulterous like everyone else, and particularly that I am not like this tax collector here. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes on all I get.’

“The tax collector stood some distance away, not daring even to raise his eyes to heaven; but he beat his breast and said, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner.’

“This man, I tell you, went home again justified; the other did not. For everyone who raises himself up will be humbled, but anyone who humbles himself will be raised up” (Luke 18:9-14).

Very frequently in the Gospels, the theme of Our Lord's conversation is prayer. In this particular passage, before talking about the Pharisee and the tax collector, He insists to His followers that “they ought always to pray and not lose heart” (Luke 18:1).

Taking into account all of His teachings, Our Lord spoke more often about the need for prayer than about any other matter apart from faith and charity. Our Lord tells us in many different ways that prayer is absolutely necessary if we are to follow Him.

At the beginning of the Pontificate of John Paul II, he said, “For me, prayer is the first priority. Prayer is the basic prerequisite to service of the Church and the world...Every believer should always think of prayer as an essential and indispensable component of one's vocation.

“It is the opus divinum, the divine work which precedes and overshadows every work. We well know that faithfulness to prayer, or its neglect, is a test of the vitality of religious life, apostolate, and Christian fidelity” (John Paul II, Address, Oct. 7, 1979).

We could add that without prayer, we cannot hope to follow Christ in the middle of the world. We need prayer as much as we need food to eat and air to breathe. That explains why the devil endeavors to keep Christians from praying with all sorts of superficial excuses.

Some days before giving this address, the Pope reminded a gathering of clergy and religious. He said, “A constant danger with priests, even zealous priests, is that they become so immersed in the work of the Lord that they neglect the Lord of the work” (John Paul II, Address, Oct. 1, 1979).

This is a danger that faces every Christian. Of what good is the most energetic apostolate if it's accomplished at the cost of one's friendship with Our Lord? It all becomes a huge mistake. The achievement would end up worthless. This would be a human endeavor where we sought only ourselves.

The remedy for this malady is clear. John Paul II says: “We must find time, we must make time, to be with the Lord in prayer (ibid). “Prayer is indispensable for you, today as yesterday” (Address, Jan. 27, 1979).

Let us look and see whether our prayer, our friendship with Jesus, really influences our life of work, our family life, our friendships, our apostolate. We know that everything is different once we have talked it over with Jesus.

It is in our prayer that “the Lord gives light to understand His truths” (St. Teresa, Foundations, 10,13). Without the help of this light, then all would be darkness. That divine light will permit us to penetrate the mystery of God and of existence.

The purpose of this parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector is to teach us the difference between true piety and false piety. We are told in the Book of Sirach that “the prayer of the humble pierces the clouds” (Sir. 35:21). It always reaches God and attains its end.

St. Luke points out that the Lord told this parable “to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and they despised others” (Luke 18:9).

Our Lord uses two figures who were familiar to His audience. “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.”

Right from the start of the parable, we see that the men share an external purpose but have entirely different agendas. The Pharisee didn't come to pray to God. He's really just talking to himself.

There is no love for God in his words, nor any vestige of humility. He stands before God and gives thanks for his own rectitude. He's patting himself on the back all the time.

Then he compares his upright behavior with that of other people and finds himself justified. Comparisons are always very dangerous. It would appear that he doesn't really need God after all.

“The tax collector stood far off.” St. Augustine says: “Because he did not thrust himself forward, God was able to approach him the more easily. He who would not lift up his eyes to heaven (Luke 18:13) now had the Lord of heaven within him. Whether the Lord is near or far actually depends on you. Love, and He will approach” (St. Augustine, Sermon 9, 21).

God is very attentive to everything that we say to Him.

The tax collector won God over through humility and trust, because “God opposes the proud, but gives his grace to the humble” (James 4:6).

The parable teaches that our prayer should be full of humility, attentive, and trusting. We should avoid acting like the ‘praying’ Pharisee with his self-centered monologue.

Our Lord reminds us that humility has to be the foundation of our dealings with God. He wants us to pray like needy children desirous of His mercy.

St. Alphonsus Liguori says, “God wants us to go to him with confidence. Bring to him your work, your projects, your fears, and whatever interests you. Act with a trusting and open heart, for God, does not speak to those who never speak to him” (St. Alphonsus Liguori, How to Converse Continually and Familiarly with God).

We have to try and flee from the prayer of self-sufficiency, which may be evidenced by complacency in our apostolate and pride in our interior struggle.

We also have to avoid negative attitudes, which can reflect a lack of trust in God's grace. Pessimism can be a manifestation of hidden pride. The time we spend in prayer should always be a time of joy, confidence, and peace.

We have to try and prepare our times of prayer well. St. Teresa wrote, “Mental prayer is nothing else, in my opinion, but being on terms of friendship with God, frequently conversing in secret with Him, who, we know, loves us” (St. Teresa, Life, 8, 7).

Another writer says, “Let us draw strength from our prayer to sanctify our daily work, to convert our contradictions into blessings, to overcome all difficulties. We will be strong to the extent that our prayer is authentic” (Francis Fernandez, In Conversation with God, Volume 5).

When we begin our prayer, “we need to ready our heart, like someone who's tuning a guitar” (St. Peter of Alcantara, Treatise on Prayer and Meditation, 1, 3).

We can offer up all our day's work to Our Lord, along with small mortifications, our interior recollection.

When we make an act of the presence of God we've begun our special time of conversation with Him. A short prayer can help to begin our dialogue. We should pray with devotion and attention: “I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me.”

God truly sees each one of us. Our recognition of this reality is itself prayer, even though we may not say a word, He understands us and we understand Him. We ask many things of Him and He asks more generosity from us, more love, more struggle.

We may not experience any special feelings in our prayer. Feelings in the spiritual life can be fairly deceptive.

Even in human life, you could feel very healthy and you could have a big cancer inside you. You could feel terrible and you can be as healthy as a horse.

Feelings can be deceptive, and in the spiritual life, particularly deceptive. The fact that we don't experience any nice feelings is not significant.

St. Josemaría used to say, “The day that you get no compensations in your prayer, when you feel dry and arid, and feel you're getting nowhere, persevere in that prayer because that may be the best prayer you ever did, because that prayer is all done for God. There is no human compensation.”

The Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith wrote some time ago: “For the person who makes a serious effort, there will often be moments in which they seem to be wandering in the desert. In spite of all their efforts, they feel nothing of God. These trials are not spared anyone who takes their prayer life seriously.

“In these moments, that prayer which that person will resolutely strive to keep to could have the impression of a certain ‘artificiality’, although really it is something totally different. In fact, at that moment, it's an expression of that person's fidelity to God, in whose presence he wishes to remain, even when he receives no subjective consolation in return.”

We might at times think that our prayer is not bearing fruit, while the reality may be that God is immensely happy with our progress. Our Lord will always give us His peace and His strength so that we may accomplish His work.

We should never abandon our prayer. St. Teresa of Avila has advised that “to lose one's way is—so it seems to me—nothing else but the giving up of prayer” (St. Teresa, Life, XIX:19).

Perhaps this can be one of the most serious temptations that can afflict souls committed to Our Lord's service: to abandon this daily conversation with God for apparent lack of fruit, for the sake of ‘more important’ things, even for apostolic activities.

Nothing is more important than our daily appointment with Jesus. He's waiting for us.

Eugene Boylan in This Tremendous Lover says, “At all costs, the decision to persevere in devoting a set time to private prayer daily must be made and carried out inflexibly. It does not matter if one can do no more than remain on one's knees for the period and only battle with a complete lack of success against distractions; one is not wasting time.”

When we spend time with Our Lord, we will always in the end be richer for it.

Some modern books about prayer often talk about the value of silence. Cardinal Sarah, in particular, talks a lot about the importance of silence for prayer.

He says: “Prayer is successfully being quiet, listening to God, and being able to hear the ineffable speaking of the Holy Spirit, who dwells in us and cries out silently” (Robert Cardinal Sarah, The Power of Silence, Point 64).

“Prayer,” he says, “demands that we successfully keep quiet so as to hear and listen to God. Silence requires absolute availability with respect to God's will. Man must be completely turned towards God and toward his brethren. Silence is a quest and a form of charity, in which God's eyes become our eyes and God's heart is grafted onto our heart. We cannot stay in the presence of the fire of divine silence without being burned” (R. Sarah, Point 116).

“The spiritual life goes through alternating phases in which God successively shows and hides himself, makes himself heard, and is quiet. Prayer teaches us the subtleties of divine speech. Is God being silent or are we not hearing him because our interior ear and our intellect are not accustomed to his language? The fruit of silence is learning to discern his voice, even though it always keeps its mystery.

“In prayer, the divine voice is powerful in that it is capable of touching us in our inmost depths, but it manifests itself in an extremely discreet way. The paths of the spiritual life are quite varied, and some may pass through a desert that seems endless. There are persons for whom God's silence in their life is almost palpable” (R. Sarah, Chapter V).

“On the merely physical level,” he says, “man can find rest only in silence. The most beautiful things in life take place in silence”—the grass grows in silence, the trees grow in silence, and the flowers grow in silence. “We can read or write when we have silence at our disposal. How is even one moment of prayer life imaginable apart from silence?” (R. Sarah, Point 20).

“There are external situations that should promote interior silence. It is necessary to provide ourselves with the means of the best possible environment for finding within us the silence that allows us to be in intimate communion with God.

“Our Lord very clearly recommends this intimacy. ‘When you pray, go into your room, shut the door, and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you’ (Matt. 6:6). Our real room is precisely ourselves. Man is invited to enter into himself and so to remain alone with God” (R. Sarah, Point 58).

“Our Lord never stops giving us an example: ‘In these days he went out to the hills to pray; and all night he continued in prayer to God’ (Luke 6:12). In this way, he teaches us the circumstances that are conducive to silent prayer. In the presence of God, in silence, we become meek and humble of heart” (R. Sarah, Point 58).

“Reading should help us to pray by concentrating our attention” so that we don't forget “the vital connection between prayer and the Word of God. How can we imagine the Lord at our side if we do not seek him where he reveals himself? Meditation consists of imagining in silence the earthly, everyday life of Jesus. It is not necessary to recall a historical event; rather, we must seek to bring the Son of God silently into our heart” (R. Sarah, Point 64).

The engine for conversion is mental prayer. Often if things don't work out, it may be that we're not the souls of prayer that we need to be. “As the deer yearns for running water, so my soul thirsts for you, my God” (Ps. 42:1).

We have to ask Our Lord to teach us how to pray so that we don't pray like the prayer of the Pharisee. Rather, our prayer is imbued with the humility of the publican, the tax collector.

John Paul II says, “Prayer is commonly held to be a conversation. In a conversation, there are always an ‘I’ and a ‘you.’ In this case the ‘You’ is with a capital Y.

“If at first the ‘I’ seems to be the most important element in prayer, prayer teaches us that the situation is actually different. The ‘You’ is more important because our prayer begins with God” (Jo Garcia-Cobb and Keith Cobb, Praying with St. John Paul II).

Christ's life on earth was one continual prayer. Prayer was the life of His soul. His whole life was prayer. We have to ask Our Lord that we might grow in this mysterious but real dialogue with God.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, in one of its headings, has a title that says, “The Battle of Prayer.” You have to work at it; you have to fight for it. But it's a great goal to fight for.

We know that the devil will go all out to prevent us from becoming that sort of prayer or from having those times of silence.

“Light makes no noise. If we want to approach this luminous source, we must assume an attitude of contemplation and silence. In order to reflect the brilliant light of Christ, Christians must resemble the Son of God. This outpouring of light is always discreet” (R. Sarah, Chapter V).

“Silence is one of the chief means that we have that enable us to enter into the spirit of prayer; silence disposes us to establish vital, ongoing relations with God. It is difficult to find a pious person who, at the same time, talks a lot. On the contrary, those who possess the spirit of prayer love silence.

“Since time immemorial, silence has been considered a rampart of innocence, the shield against temptations, and the fertile source of recollection. Silence fosters prayer because it awakens good thoughts in our hearts. St. Bernard says it enables the soul to think better about God and about the realities of heaven. For this...reason, all the saints have ardently loved silence” (R. Sarah, Conclusion).

Lord, help me to look forward to those periods, and opportunities for those periods, of silence that you give me.

Help me to see that certain issues have to pass through my prayer. Help me to be hitting the important topics, to make firmer resolutions, to have holy intimacies. Help me to be a soul of prayer so that I have a tender love for Jesus.

The value of prayer doesn't depend on what we feel, but on the love with which we try to do it and the humility with which we try to do it.

The publican and tax collector in this parable—he's the example to follow. The haughty Pharisee is the one to be avoided.

When we work on our prayer, it helps us to see everything with a supernatural outlook. It gives us peace in all circumstances.

The best remedy for our interior life is prayer. That's where we grow.

Our minds and our hearts have to be at work in prayer. There should be a wholehearted turning to God at the start of our prayer.

Action is not an excuse for prayer. We need that divine life, that breath of divine life.

We can be grateful to God for the fact that we know how to pray and we have the grace of prayer. It's the language of hope. It teaches us to love the Will of God in all things.

The more we're involved in professional and apostolic activities, the more important our prayer becomes. In The Forge, we're told, “The way to cut short all evils we suffer is to pray” (Josemaría Escrivá, The Forge, Point 76).

We could ask Our Lord to go deeper in this parable, to see the dangers of pride in our prayer, the importance of humility, because “the prayer of the humble pierces the clouds.”

Mary, may you teach me how to pray with a greater spirit of humility, so that my prayer may be more effective, as you want it to be.

I thank you, my God, for the good resolutions, affections, and inspirations that you have communicated to me during this meditation. I ask your help to put them into practice. My Immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph, my father and lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

OLV