Two men went up to the temple to pray...
Yes, the first man Jesus describes is a bit of a caricature.
O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity --
greedy, dishonest, adulterous -- or even like this tax collector.
Most of us would never quite have the hubris he describes, although I think we often come close.
We spent the last half-century building up our "self-esteem" convinced that it would make us better people. The evidence now shows that it has done quite the opposite. We overshot the mark and went past self-esteem to egocentrism.
The tax collector in today's gospel utters a simple act of contrition:
O God, be merciful to me a sinner
With those simple words, six words in Greek, he places before God all of his sins and begs for mercy. He does what, in our culture, has become almost impossible. He humbles himself.
The word St. Luke uses for sinner, amartolos, literally refers to the archer who has missed the mark and therefore does not share the prize.
We have convinced ourselves that we are so fragile we can't say, "That was bad" or "That is not good enough".
Jesus teaches us that we are stronger than that. We were created to be more. We were created to be saints. But to get there we must be able to admit when we fail, when we have missed the mark. And we must be willing to throw ourselves on the mercy of God. Then, and only then, He can remake us into the image of His Son Jesus Christ.
