Fraternal correction, a matter of symphony!
Year A – 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time
Matthew 18:15-20: “If your brother commits a fault…”
The Gospel passages for this Sunday and the next belong to Jesus’ fourth discourse according to St Matthew: the ecclesial or community discourse (Matthew 18). Let us recall the previous ones: the first, the Sermon on the Mount (chs. 5-7); the second, the missionary discourse (ch. 10); the third, the discourse in parables (ch. 13). In this fourth discourse, Matthew has gathered together some of Jesus’ teachings on the life of the ecclesial community.
Today’s passage deals with “fraternal correction”, in the case of a serious sin that hinders fraternal communion. The text has come down to us in two variants: a shorter one, which places greater emphasis on the ecclesial dimension: “If your brother commits a fault”; and a longer one, which adds “against you”, thus referring to a personal offence (the version chosen by the liturgical text). The passage brings together three teachings of Jesus, closely interconnected. The three readings for this Sunday are, moreover, easily linked to one another and shed further light on the Gospel: the prophet Ezekiel is appointed as a watchman responsible for his brothers (Ezekiel 33), while St Paul proclaims love as the fulfilment of the Law (Romans 13:8-10).
The art of fraternal correction
Fraternal correction is an art that requires love and sensitivity, intelligence and tact. I find it difficult to speak about fraternal correction. For three reasons. The first, because of the difficulty inherent in this task. The second, because for centuries we priests have wrongly claimed this role as our own “right”, whereas it is a duty of every baptised person; moreover, we have carried it out clumsily and, at times, disastrously. So, rather than correcting others, we should allow ourselves to be corrected! The third, because today speaking about correction is not “politically correct”; we risk infringing on each person’s “privacy” and being reproached for interfering in other people’s affairs. We are therefore moving through a minefield and prefer to fall back on criticism, gossip or indifference!
1. A rescue operation!
WHERE would I begin? With the verse immediately preceding today’s passage: “It is the will of your Father who is in heaven that not one of these little ones should be lost” (v. 14). Our starting point, then, is the Father’s saving will. It is a “pedagogy of recovery” (Pope Francis). And the aim is to “win your brother back” (v. 15). To recover a child and win back a brother! It is a… rescue operation!
WHAT should we do in practice? Jesus suggests a method structured in three gradual steps, introduced by the word “if” (five times): first, alone; then, if necessary, with one or two witnesses; and finally, if needed, involving the community, even to the extreme case of recognising the brother’s or sister’s self-exclusion from the community: “Let him be to you as a pagan and a tax collector”. This, however, does not mean excluding that person from fraternal love, because Jesus was a friend of tax collectors and sinners.
2. An act of fraternity
HOW should it be done? What is the essential condition for offering correction? Fraternity! Becoming a brother!
The word “brother” has particular importance in Matthew’s Gospel. It is interesting to note that it is generally accompanied by a possessive: “my brother”, “your brother”, “my brothers”… The evangelist wishes to emphasise the relational value at the heart of Jesus’ message: “you have one Father” and “you are all brothers” (Matthew 23:8-9). Christ is the firstborn Son among a multitude of brothers (Romans 8:29).
Love is at the heart of the relationship: “Brothers, owe no one anything, except to love one another” (Romans 13:8, second reading).
Love and truth go hand in hand, but love is the elder sister. In fraternal correction, putting truth first is like exposing someone to the noonday sun: there is a risk of blinding the person who is being led out of the dark room of error. Love, on the other hand, is like the dawn, which gradually leads towards the full light.
3. A matter of symphony!
WHERE does fraternal correction lead? To the symphony of fraternal communion! “If two of you on earth agree to ask for anything…”.
The Greek verb used by Matthew for “to agree” (symphonei) belongs to the same family as our word “symphony”: we might almost translate it, suggestively, as “to symphonise”! The community is like an orchestra in which each person performs their own part and plays their own instrument. Each one contributes a particular note or sound that enriches the overall beauty of the symphony. If someone plays out of tune, plays badly or loses the beat, they are not excluded, but “corrected”. The Father, who loves the “symphony” created by the presence of his Son, gladly listens to the community that prays in harmony. And heaven tunes itself to earth: “Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven”.
It may happen, however, that someone wants to impose their own voice or drown out the other instruments, causing disharmony and confusion; or that someone claims to be able to play every instrument and to have no need of anyone else’s collaboration. Such self-centred protagonism ends up generating passivity, apathy and disengagement in others.
Unfortunately, even in that privileged moment of “symphony” which the Eucharist should be, this “agreement”, this “symphonising”, is often lacking. Sometimes people pray or celebrate side by side, simply placed next to one another. The same prayers and gestures are repeated, but there is no “one heart and one soul” (Acts 4:32). Moreover, the priest who presides at the Eucharist, and who should be like the “conductor of the orchestra”, often ends up being almost the sole protagonist, monopolising a large part of the celebration. We truly have an urgent need for synodality, to walk together as the people of God.
Reflection for the week
I invite you to meditate on and apply to yourselves the verse from the Alleluia: “God reconciled the world to himself in Christ, entrusting to us the message of reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:19). The Christian vocation is to reconcile!
Fr Manuel João Pereira Correia, MCCJ
Fr. Manuel João, comboni missionary
Sunday Reflection
from the womb of my whale, ALS
Our cross is the pulpit of the Word
