Good News

Saint Luke pictures Jesus at the dinner table of Simon the Pharisee, and the sinner is at his feet. “Shock! Horror!” cry the tabloids, “Preacher accepts public caresses of notorious prostitute!” Simon says to himself: “If this man was a prophet he would know what sort of woman this is, what a bad name she has.”

Simon lives in the categories of clean and unclean, of insiders and outsiders. The social fabric is threatened by accepting the presence of such a person at his table.

For Jesus there are no outsiders. He does not take issue with the accusation of being a glutton and drunkard. He sees food and drink not as a mark of who is holy, but as a means of uniting himself with all, clean and unclean alike. “Wisdom is justified in all her children,” says Jesus. Wisdom does not consist in knowing the rules and passing judgment, but in befriending all her children, men and women, like the sinner. That is his Good News.