Rather than despair and lose hope, help others in God’s name

Everyone wants to be a winner.

In today’s Gospel, the tax collector is the winner as he has direct access to God because he recognizes his sinfulness. He knows he cheats his neighbor for tax purposes and does not love them and they do not love him. As a tax collector, he was despised.

Knowing full well his low standing with the townspeople and his God, he needed God’s mercy. So, he skipped quietly into the temple to beg earnestly for that mercy. He knew he was a sinner and God knew it, too. God was his only chance for forgiveness for no one else would give him the time of day.

Having gained unfair advantage over his neighbor, he had taken more money than required and now he wished to repent and receive God’s mercy for a new beginning. God is welcoming to sinners and has compassion on the tax collector. His humility and lowliness, as choice virtues, and not weakness, grants him forgiveness.

The Pharisee in this Gospel said his prayer to himself and directed it to himself and not God. He is congratulating himself on his goodness and does not ask God for anything. Humility and an attitude of sorrow or at last accepting the faults of oneself are required for forgiveness. Jesus says, “The one who humbles himself will be exalted.” Those who seek exaltation will never find it.

With Halloween, we dare to dress up and be another. In the beginning of this Eve of All Saints, people used to dress up like a saint and then strive to imitate that person in the next month. It is not so much to scare people or dress up crazily, but to stop and, as the name “Halloween” states — Hallow — to make the name of God “all praised.” This is what we state in the Our Father, “Hallowed be thy name.”

Rather than just living each day of this eleventh month, we stop and ask in humility to be more like the saints in love and charity for God and others.

Rather than letting despair, fear and hopelessness take over, we look to see what we can do in God’s name to help others. Like

Stop and ask in humility to be more like the saints in love and charity for God and others.

St. Paul as a model, in the second reading, we can offer ourselves as a libation and sacrifice self for others. Like our clocks fall back one hour next Sunday morning, we need to fall back on striving to live the truth. We are all sinners and need God’s mercy. Don’t judge others or let pride take control of your life.

The Book of Sirach mentions the widow and the orphan, the lowly and the oppressed, and that God has no favorites but that the Lord hears the cry of the poor. Let us look inside ourselves as did the tax collector and recognize our needs. May we have an attitude of humility that comes from the heart and not just dress up crazily to hallow the Lord’s name as we soon begin a new month.