REFLECTION October 26, 2025

             “The humble man’s prayer pierces the clouds”,

says the writer of the Book of Ecclesiasticus (also known as Sirach), in to-day’s first reading. Interestingly enough, the Pharisee about whom Our Lord tells His parable in the Gospel reading must know this text, even if he is a fictional character. After all, Our Lord is telling the story not about a particular individual, but about a well-known type of person.

     The Pharisee who marches up to the front of the Temple and loudly thanks God that he is not like the rest of men, and especially not like the miserable tax-collector at the back who has dared to show his face in God’s Holy Place—such a man must have been a familiar character in Our Lord’s day. The Pharisees not only thought that they were better than everybody who wasn't one of them, but that they wanted everyone else to know it, too. If they knew that the “humble man’s prayer pierces the clouds”, why didn’t they show humility? It was simply because while they would recognise the truth of that statement in Scripture, they genuinely believed that it did not apply to them. They had no need of humility because they were already perfect.

     For the Pharisees, humility is something that only others need to have. They themselves can get the same results from their prayers without the need for humility (or modesty). God will surely hear them without the need for self-abasement—that’s for sinful types. But they need to be humble because they have sinned grievously. They have disobeyed the Law. They have neglected the commandments. What Our Lord’s parable teaches us is not that truly humble people are nicer to know than proud self- satisfied ones, because we surely know that already! Rather, Our Lord’s message is that everyone, including the Pharisee, is totally in need of God’s mercy. Nobody in this world is holy without God making them so. We can (and indeed should) become Saints, but we cannot do so without the Grace of God which comes from Our Lord and is given in His Church and in the Sacraments.

     We may think that Pharisees are rather remote and unpleasant religious bigots not in the least bit like modern people. But the truth is that if we think that we our-selves are capable of becoming holy without the Mass, the Sacraments, prayer and humility, then we are fooling ourselves. In fact, you don’t even need to be religious to be a Pharisee! How many people do you hear saying: “I don’t need to go to Church. I’m good to my neighbour and I don’t do anyone any harm”. Sounds familiar? Look at the Gospel and spot whom it resembles!     

~     Fr. Paul Dobson.