Gospel of John, chapter 8:11

Sometimes we feel that life has passed us by. We may feel it is too late to start all over again. The gospel of John, chapter eight, has something to say to you if you ever felt that way. This reading promises hope and new beginnings to those who can listen and respond. If we listen with great care, we can hear the melody of hope grow stronger and stronger in this gospel reading until it overpowers the original sad story. In the midst of every sin and every humiliation, there is an offer of something better; of hope and future joy. This call to hope is the sweet music that lies behind the depressing events of the woman caught in adultery in today’s gospel.

Christianity is a religion of hope for those who believe in the new life that Jesus brought to the world. Each moment is the end of the present and the beginning of a hopeful future. Jesus has gone before us and proved that there is nothing that should frighten us.

The saints have been ordinary men and women who were sinners but they left the life of sin behind and went on to live new and hopeful lives. The woman in the gospel story and of course, Mary Madalen and the Apostles were among the first to do this. They were called to leave behind the events of the past and plunge ahead into new lives of freedom.

St. Paul was a man who knew failure. He had been a promising young Pharisee on the rise in Jewish circles. He was well educated, dedicated and ready to take his place among the rulers of Israel. He was also selfrighteous and intollerant of those not like him. Then, all that changed. He left his former life behind and found true freedom in following Jesus.

The woman in today’s gospel found her dignity in Jesus’ act of forgiveness. She found the strength to sin no more; to leave the old life of sin behind and begin anew. She found renewed hope in Jesus’ act of forgiveness.

It was Alexander Pope who said: “Hope springs eternal in the human breast.” If we fail to forgive one another, we deprive them of hope. Nobody should live without hope, for hope is tomorrow’s triumph over today’s disappointments. To be a Christian, C.S. Lewis remarked in an essay that forgiveness “means to forgive the inexcusable because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.” This is the good news of today’s Gospel story: forgive, forgive, and forgive again so that God can forgive you unconditionally:
“Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

Fr. Hugh Duffy