30th Sunday in Ordinary Time

To The Epiphany Community 

Prayer Becomes Authentic: When the Heart Turns from the Mirror of Self to the Mercy of God 

(30 Week in Ordinary Time, Luke 18:9-14, 26 October 2025) 

Today, Jesus wants to show us the right attitude for prayer and for invoking the mercy of the Father; how one must pray; the right attitude for prayer. It is the parable of the pharisee and the tax collector (Luke 18:9-14). Both men went up into the Temple to pray, but they do so in very different ways, obtaining opposite results. The pharisee stood and prayed using many words. His is yes, a prayer of thanksgiving to God, but it is really just a display of his own merits, with a sense of superiority over other men, whom he describes as extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even, for example, referring to the other one there, like this tax collector (Luke 18: 11). But this is the real problem: that pharisee prays to God, but in truth he is just self-laudatory. He is praying to himself! Instead of having the Lord before his eyes, he has a mirror. Yet, his attitude and his words are far from the way of God’s words and actions, the God who loves all men and does not despise sinners. (Pope Francis, Angelus, 2019) 

Dearly Beloved Brothers and Sisters in Jesus Christ, Today’s Gospel invites us into the sacred heart of prayer — not prayer as technique or performance, but as relationship, as encounter. Jesus speaks to those who were convinced of their own righteousness and despised others (Luke 18:9). In this brief but piercing parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, He unveils a truth that cuts across all times and cultures: that the authenticity of prayer does not lie in words, posture, or pious appearance, but in the disposition of the heart before God. Prayer is not about convincing God of our worth, but about allowing ourselves to be found by His mercy. It is the meeting place between divine compassion and human poverty — a threshold where pride dissolves and grace begin. The Pharisee and the tax collector represent two spiritual postures: one prays with himself before a mirror; the other prays to God before the mystery. One is filled with merit; the other is emptied in repentance. Only the empty vessel can be filled with grace. Today, then, Jesus wants to show us the right attitude for prayer — how to stand before the Father not with self-satisfaction, but with truth and humility; not with self-justification, but with a heart open to mercy. 

The Drama of Prayer: Between the Mirror and the Mystery-Two men go up to the Temple to pray — one stands before God; the other stands before himself. Both enter the sacred space, but only one truly encounters the divine. The Pharisee’s words rise like incense without fragrance; they circle around his own ego. His prayer becomes a mirror reflecting his self-sufficiency rather than an opening to grace. The tax collector, meanwhile, stands at a distance, his eyes cast down, his heart broken open. He utters no long discourse, only a cry — God, be merciful to me, a sinner. 

This parable unveils a deep anthropology of prayer. To pray rightly is to move from self-reflection to God-reflection, from the illusion of self-possession to the humility of dependence. The Pharisee represents man curved inward (homo incurvatus in se), while the tax collector embodies man turned outward in receptivity — homo adorans, the one whose being is openness to the Infinite. 

The Theology of Humility: Truth Before Grace-True prayer is born where self-illusion dies. The Pharisee’s error is not his good works — fasting and tithing are good — but his self-reference. He treats grace as merit and God as audience. His prayer is theological theater. The tax collector, however, stands in truth. He offers no argument, no self-defense, no merit — only need. And that is precisely what draws God’s mercy. 

St. Augustine says: God is closer to the humble than to the proud, because the proud carry their hearts high and cannot see Him who is above them. The tax collector’s bowed head is thus not shame, but alignment — the posture of reality before God. Theology here meets ontology: humility is not a virtue among others; it is the very condition for truth, for only the humble live in accordance with what is real — that we are creatures sustained by mercy. 

The Mystery of Prayer: From Performance to Presence-In the Temple, both men are praying, but only one is praying to God. The Pharisee performs; the tax collector participates. The difference lies in orientation. The Pharisee’s prayer moves horizontally — toward comparison, toward others, toward his own reflection. The tax collector’s prayer moves vertically — toward transcendence, toward the silent gaze of the Father. 

This is the decisive turn in Christian prayer: not eloquence but surrender; not posture but poverty of spirit. Jesus says the one who went home justified was not the man who proved himself righteous, but the one who knew he was not. For God’s mercy can only fill what is empty. The heart that is full of self has no room for grace. 

The Existential Invitation: Becoming Transparent to Mercy-Every act of prayer is a revelation of who we think God is — and who we think we are. The Pharisee believes in a God who rewards performance; the tax collector believes in a God who saves the broken. The first prays at God; the second prays into God. To pray as the tax collector is to enter the mystery of divine love that bends down to the sinner. It is to allow oneself to be seen, to stand in truth, to be forgiven. In this sense, prayer is not our ascent to God but God’s descent into our poverty. 

Theologically, this movement is Christological. On the Cross, Jesus prays the perfect prayer of the tax collector: Father, forgive them. He lowers Himself into the depths of human misery so that every sinner may rise justified. In Him, humility and divinity meet. 

A Portrait of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector-The Pharisee: The Man Before the Mirror 

The Pharisee stands tall, confident, and articulate. His garments are clean, his record spotless, his conscience self-assured. He has mastered religion as an achievement. His fasting, tithing, and observance are impeccable. Yet, beneath the perfection lies a tragedy: he has confused holiness with performance, righteousness with comparison. His prayer rises, but not to heaven; it circles back to himself: I thank you, Lord, that I am not like other men. He speaks to God, but listens only to his own echo. The temple becomes a stage; God, a silent spectator. The divine mystery has been replaced by a moral mirror — a reflection of his self-made piety. 

The Pharisee represents the autonomous self — the one who believes that virtue originates in the will rather than in grace. Theologically, he is the image of humanity unredeemed, still trying to justify itself before God through its own merit. He stands, but he does not kneel; he praises, but he does not love; he observes, but he does not adore. In him, religion has become self-reference — a closed circle without transcendence. His tragedy is not that he is evil, but that he no longer needs mercy. 

The Tax Collector: The Man Before the Mystery-At the other end of the temple, a man stands in silence. His head is bowed, his chest is struck — not in despair, but in recognition. His life, littered with compromise and sin, now becomes the very soil of grace. He dares not lift his eyes to heaven; yet his humility lifts his heart higher than all the Pharisee’s words. His prayer is only one line: God, be merciful to me, a sinner. In that single breath lies an entire theology — of creation, fall, and redemption. He acknowledges the distance between himself and God, yet that very distance becomes the space where mercy descends. He is not eloquent, but he is true. He does not enumerate his merits, for he has none. But he knows the infinite worth of divine compassion. He embodies homo viator — the human being as pilgrim and penitent, aware of his dependence and open to transcendence. Theologically, he stands as the icon of the justified sinner — one who has nothing to give but himself, and in doing so, receives everything. His humility is not humiliation; it is truth made visible. He leaves the temple justified, not because of what he has done, but because of what he has allowed God to do in him. The tax collector becomes a window of grace, transparent to divine mercy. 

Two Temples, Two Theologies-In the end, the parable is not about two men, but two ways of being human. The Pharisee builds a temple around himself; the tax collector enters the Temple of God. The Pharisee prays from his pride; the tax collector prays from his poverty. The Pharisee trusts in his virtue; the tax collector entrusts himself to God’s mercy. One stands before a mirror — and sees himself. The other stands before Mystery — and sees God. 

The Interior Application-Every heart contains both men. There is a Pharisee within us who wants to stand tall, to be right, to measure holiness. And there is a tax collector within us who knows that our true worth is not in our performance, but in being loved by God. The journey of conversion is the gradual dethroning of the inner Pharisee, and the awakening of the humble soul who knows how to say: Lord, have mercy. Thus, the true temple is the heart. And the heart is sanctified not by the perfection of our deeds, but by the sincerity of our repentance. 

Concluding Summary The Pharisee and the tax collector are not opposites to be judged, but mirrors to be discerned. The former shows us what happens when religion loses relationship; the latter reveals what happens when sin meets mercy. In the space between them lies the path of every believer — from pride to humility, from self to God, from justification by works to justification by grace. For it is the humble, contrite heart — and not the self-assured spirit — that goes home justified before God. 

The Gospel ends with a paradox: the one who humbles himself is exalted. This is not moral arithmetic but metaphysical truth. In the economy of grace, self-emptying is the law of divine life. The Pharisee, enclosed in self-sufficiency, remains unjustified. The tax collector, open in his need, becomes transparent to God’s mercy. Thus, the right attitude for prayer is not prideful rectitude but contrite communion. It is to let our heart echo the rhythm of the Psalmist: A humble, contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. May our prayer, then, be not a mirror of the self but a window toward the Face of God — the Face revealed in Jesus Christ, who is Mercy made flesh (Psalm 50:1ff.) 

Dear Faithful of the Epiphany Community, let us pray: Lord Jesus, teach us to pray — not as those who justify themselves, but as those who are justified by You. Empty us of pride, fill us with truth, and let every word of our prayer be a cry of the heart: God, be merciful to me, a sinner. 

Fraternally,
Fr. John Peter Lazaar SAC, Pastor