'That Man Is You'

2 Sm 12:7-10, 13 · Gal 2:16, 19-21 · Lk 7:36-8:3

The Talmud tells us, ''A child tells in the street what its father says at home.'' Much to the embarrassment of many parents, this adage is true. One father tells of taking his three-year-old son with him to see Grandma and Papa. While visiting, Grandma and her grandson baked cookies while dad and Papa watched a football game. Upon tasting a sample from the first batch, the three-year-old held the cookie out saying, ''Damn, this is good!''

Grandma gasped. The father said he jumped from his chair and corrected his son saying, ''That's not a nice word! Where did you learn that word?'' The boy instantly replied, ''I learned it from you, Daddy. You say it every time Momma fixes supper.''

As we celebrate Fathers' Day we want to celebrate the good our fathers have done for us. We should celebrate good example and our fathers' love. But we must be mindful too of children without fathers, or worse, children who have fathers who do not parent.

Our first reading tells us a story of how a father's sin can lead to the destruction of his family and possibly even that of others. We know the story of David, how he observed the wife of Uriah on her roof and was immediately smitten. He saw something he wanted regardless of the consequences. So self-centered and self-absorbed was he that he had Uriah killed.

Because what David did was not far removed from the moral code of some surrounding cultures, he refused to see that what he had done was wrong. Nathan the prophet, at God's request, went to David and told David about a rich man who invited a poor man to his home. The rich man had many flocks of sheep, but while the poor man was with him, he took the poor man's only sheep for himself. The King was enraged and demanded to know who this man was so that he could see that justice was done. Nathan simply responded, ''That man is you.''

David caught on to the enormity of his sin and begged forgiveness. God loved David, as God loves all his children, and God granted forgiveness, but God did not free David from the consequences of his sin.

David's sons became divided, rebelled against their father, and tried to steal his throne. David's soldiers, out of love for their king, tracked down one of David's rebellious sons, Absalom, whom David loved dearly, and killed him, leaving David to grieve for what his choice had wrought.

Paul speaks of being justified by Christ. For Catholics, the term ''justification'' is very confusing as it is not a regular word in our faith vocabulary. Although we usually associate it with doctrinal differences between Catholic and Protestants, it is a useful word for us. We might think of our word processing programs. When we set up a text we can ''justify'' it. We can choose to ''left justify,'' ''right justify,'' or even ''full justify.'' All of these have to do with how we want our text to line up on a page.

Justification is the process by which God frees us from original sin, thus saving us. This was done through the saving passion and death of Jesus Christ. Simply put, God wanted to get us ''lined up,'' to be consistent with the life created for us. Paul's point is that there is nothing we can do to justify ourselves. This is something God does for us. Mere obedience to God's law does not justify us. But, in our Catholic viewpoint, while we cannot ''earn'' or ''merit'' our salvation, we do have a choice. We can choose whether or not we want to line up with God's plan for us.

The Gospel tells the story of a woman who wanted to be ''lined up'' with God, the woman who wanted forgiveness. What she did for Jesus earned her nothing. In seeing her love and desire, Jesus simply announced that her faith, her love, her willingness to accept the forgiveness already offered her was hers. Her tears, then, were ones of gratitude.

How a father lives his life has a huge impact on teaching his children, most particularly his sons. From their fathers, sons learn how to be a man. It is vitally important, then, that fathers understand what a man is and, particularly, what a Christian man is. Mothers can fuss at their children all they want about going to church, but children in a family in which the father attends regularly are far more likely to remain active in their own faith. (This is not to say a mother's example is unimportant! Mothers have certain influences fathers can't touch.)

Are we willing to let go of our desires and let God justify us? Or, are we living like David forgetting who we are? TP