23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time - Year A
Serious Conversation
Rev. James A. Wickersham

Does your conscience ever convict you? Does it ever tell you that something in your life needs to change?

Conscience is more than a feeling of guilt. It is the judgment within us that recognizes what is right and calls us to do it. It must be formed by Scripture, prayer, the Holy Spirit, and the teaching of the Church.

If my conscience always agrees with my desires, my opinions, and the way I live, then perhaps it is not guiding me at all. Perhaps it is merely echoing me.

That is why we respond today:

“If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.”

In the first reading, God appoints Ezekiel as a watchman for Israel. A watchman warns the people when danger approaches. If Ezekiel sees the danger and remains silent, God will hold him accountable. If he gives the warning, he has fulfilled his duty, even if the people refuse to listen. The watchman must sound the warning. He cannot make the people heed it.

God does not leave us unwarned. He speaks through Sacred Scripture. He forms and awakens our conscience. He may speak through someone who loves us enough to say something difficult. And he speaks through the teaching of the Church.

Fraternal correction may be one of the hardest things we can pull off. None of us—and I mean none of us—is perfect. If I approach another person from a place of moral superiority, convinced that I am right and he is beneath me, bad things are soon to happen.

That is why St. Paul tells us:

“Owe nothing to anyone, except to love one another.”

Love is not merely affection or approval. Love is not keeping everyone comfortable. Love seeks the good of another person. Sometimes love requires us to say something difficult. At other times, love requires us to hear something difficult.

Love is not an alternative to truth. Love is the reason we tell the truth.

In the Gospel, Jesus gives us a way to approach a brother who has sinned. Go first to him privately. Do not begin by telling everyone else. Do not embarrass him publicly. Speak directly to him.

Jesus also tells us the goal: “If he listens to you, you have won over your brother.”

The goal is not to win the argument. The goal is to win over the brother.

If he refuses to listen, Jesus says to take one or two others. Only afterward should it be brought before the Church. Then Jesus speaks of the Church’s authority to bind and loose and promises, “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”

Christ has not left us alone with our own judgment. Our confidence in the Church does not depend on bishops and priests never failing. It rests on Christ’s promise that he will not abandon his Church. He remains in her midst as she teaches the truth about faith and morals, calls sinners to conversion, and offers forgiveness.

The Church is not here to tell us that everything we already think and do is right. Christ gave her authority to teach us, and sometimes that teaching corrects us.

The danger is that we hear all this and immediately begin thinking about someone else who needs correction.

While praying with today’s psalm, I found myself thinking about people who refuse to listen. Then the Lord brought something in my own life to mind.

I realized that I have neglected a conversation with my mother for years. From time to time, she has spoken about regrets she has in raising my sister and me. I have usually kept my head down and not said much. But what I need to tell her is this: I would not want any other mother. She was not perfect, but I was not a perfect son either. Everything that has happened has brought us here, and here is not a bad place to be. I have nothing but gratitude in my heart for her love and all the sacrifices she made for us.

I had been thinking about other people who needed to listen. Then the Lord brought this conversation to mind, and I realized the psalm was speaking to me. Sometimes conscience convicts us not only of something wrong we have done, but of an act of love we have left undone.

And so I return to the question: Does your conscience ever convict you?

When the Church teaches something you find difficult, do you seek understanding—or immediately begin explaining why the Church must be wrong?

When was the last time your conscience led you to apologize, return to Confession, make amends, or begin a conversation you had been avoiding?

A hard heart is not a heart that has made mistakes. All of us have made mistakes. A hard heart is one that has decided it will no longer listen.

The question is not whether correction will come. God loves us too much to leave us unwarned. The question is whether we will listen when it comes.

“If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.”