By Fr. Paul D. Scalia
Are you a hypocrite? Well, sometimes it can feel that way. At least, it should. Anyone who strives for something great should be aware of his failures and how far short he falls of the ideal. All the more when the ideal is Christ himself. You go to Mass, pray the Rosary, and give thanks before meals. But then you yell at your children, covet your neighbor’s goods (and wife), eat too much, and so on. Yes, we feel the division between what we believe and how we behave. At times we can feel like hypocrites.
Now, part of that division comes from being children of Adam. Our human nature is wounded. We have inherited the disintegration that is part of original sin. Our thoughts, words, and actions are not integrated, not whole and complete. But part of this is also our own doing, our own failure to live a life of integrity. And every time we sin, we aggravate that division.
Of course, “Hypocrites!” is the classic accusation hurled against serious Catholics or against anyone who simply strives for something more than the world’s paltry offerings. People see that Catholics do not live up to what we profess. They see us living in contradiction to what we claim to believe and to what we aspire to be. It is hypocrisy, plain and simple. Or so it would seem.
Thus, the one who strives and the hypocrite look very much alike: both say one thing and do another. The word hypocrite comes from the Greek meaning actor. Both parties seem to be precisely that: actors playing something they are not. But we know there is a profound difference between the two. The sinner not yet is the Christian he desires to be. The hypocrite does not even desire it.
The striving sinner is discontented by the division within him. He wants to be made whole: to think, speak, and act according to what he knows is true. He wants to live according to the truth of who he is and what he is called to be. His failure to do so is a cause of frustration and, more importantly, of repentance.
The hypocrite, on the other hand, has made peace with his inner division. He is neither bothered nor tormented by his lack of integrity. He is less concerned with conforming to an ideal and more with performing that ideal before others… or reshaping the ideal to fit his conduct. He does not strive for truth, but for comfort, power, or gain.
Which brings us to today’s Gospel about two sons (Matthew 21:28-32): the first rebellious and the second apparently obedient. On the surface, both seem hypocritical. But, again, there is a profound difference.
The first son—who represents the tax collectors and prostitutes—is divided, but capable of repentance. “I will not,” he tells his father. But afterward he changes his mind and conforms to the father’s will. He was rebellious, to be sure. But he also had the capacity to repent. He lost his way, but not his compass.
The second son—who represents the chief priests and elders of the people—is a hypocrite. That is our Lord’s preferred term for describing the leaders (see, for example, Matthew 23). The second son says one thing—“Yes, sir”—and does another, without any scruple or remorse of conscience. Nor does he repent of the contradiction he has introduced into his soul and into the world. He has made peace with it.
The point is that the greater defect in the second son is not disobedience, but the lack of repentance. What offends God more than sin is denying it and refusing to repent. Thus Jesus brings the lesson to its conclusion when he rebukes the chief priests and elders, not so much for their initial error but because “afterward they did not repent [change their minds] and believe.”
The parable reveals why we always find our Lord so patient and kind with the “tax collectors and sinners.” It is not because he makes light of their sins (that would be the modern solution). It is because he finds in them a discontent and discomfort, a desire for integrity and, therefore, a capacity to repent and be restored.
By the same reasoning, our Lord is severe with the chief priests and elders. It is not because they have authority that he rebukes them (as, again, a modern reading would have it), but because they have made peace with the division within them. They have grown accustomed to saying an insincere “Yes” to the Father and then doing as they please. He finds nothing in them to work with because they lack the capacity to change their minds and believe.
We want to be men and women of integrity, to live whole and complete lives, consistent in thought, word, and deed. This requires two fundamental habits.
First, a constant orientation to the truth. Only adherence to the truth about God and man can bring that interior integrity we desire. Without truth as our polestar, we veer toward divisive and degrading goals: possessions, pleasure, and power. Either we conform to what is true, or we are divided by our own desires. As the now-beatified Fulton Sheen once observed: “If you do not behave as you believe, you will end by believing as you behave.”
Second, continual repentance. In our fallen human nature, repentance is necessary for integrity. St. Thomas More, a man already known in his time as a man of integrity, was aware of his sinfulness and his need to repent. The man of integrity is not sinless. But neither is he a hypocrite. He knows when he says “No” to the Father and repents of it.
The Church does not claim that her saints (except Our Lady) were perfect. She recognizes that—although they are now saints—they were still sinners in this world. The integrity—wholeness, holiness—they now possess came from being repentant and always returning to the Father.
About the Author
Fr. Paul Scalia is a priest of the Diocese of Arlington, VA, where he serves as Episcopal Vicar for Clergy and pastor of Saint James in Falls Church. He is the author of That Nothing May Be Lost: Reflections on Catholic Doctrine and Devotion and editor of Sermons in Times of Crisis: Twelve Homilies to Stir Your Soul.