Loving the Sinner
Luke 19:1-10

Fr. Jijo Kandamkulathy CMF
Claretian Missionaries

Zacchaeus, a publican considered evil by all, is in search of Jesus. By a strange twist of fate the name he carries means pure, righteous. He is short in stature, referring to how he appears in the eyes of all. Zacchaeus is well aware of his condition.

He had everything in life, and yet is deeply dissatisfied. He has participated in many banquets, and is still looking for food that satisfies. The need he experiences is so irresistible that he is willing to risk the ridicule of the public. Zacchaeus has heard of Jesus. He knows the harsh judgments he delivered on wealth, but he also knows that he is “the friend of publicans and sinners” (Lk 7:34). He wants to see Jesus because—he thinks—perhaps he is the only one who may understand his anxieties and inner drama, and he goes up the sycamore tree to see him.

Zacchaeus is the name for a conscience that is guilty and cringes at every derisive look of friends and neighbors, someone who has lost his self-respect. He has begun to look at himself from the same ruthless and murderous look of others. He has begun to hate himself. He has committed mistakes, and his mistakes are public. He has lost face. He is trying to get out of his mistakes, but the loss of self-esteem just does not give him enough energy to get out of his problems. He does not even think of touching the clothes of Jesus like the woman with a hemorrhage. He only wants to see him, as he hopes to get all the strength he needs to amend his life. This man’s faith is even stronger than that of the woman.

In this desperate search, the crowd who accompany Jesus intervene. As it happened with the blind man of Jericho (Lk 18:39), instead of favoring the encounter with the Master the crowd stands in between and becomes an impediment. It does not understand that it is the “small,” “the impure,” the outcasts that Jesus is looking for. The reason for this attitude is a defect of sight.

In Zacchaeus, even those who follow Jesus can see only the publican, the sinner, the loan shark, no one else. Their discriminatory attitude is like that of the Pharisees. The sight of these “pure” people is so bad that it sees evil everywhere, even where there isn’t—in Jesus.

“Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house.” None of the crowd has pronounced this name because Zacchaeus is “unclean.” Only Jesus calls “Zacchaeus”—pure! For him he is “pure” and he is also a son of Abraham.

From above he sought to see Jesus, but now Jesus who from below sees him first. In front of the sinner, Jesus always raises his eyes because his position is of the servant, who humbled himself for the salvation of all! What have those who looked down on Zacchaeus got? Nothing. With no appeal, their sentences have done nothing but to make him wicked. The stern and grim looks of the censors, judges, prosecutors only block the unique look that saves, that tender look of Christ.
The story ends with a dinner. We observe who is inside the banquet and who is outside, who celebrates and who is sad. The “righteous” should be inside, instead they’re all out murmuring, fretting with rage because they don’t agree with the type of guests Jesus wanted to fill the hall.

Zacchaeus was admitted to the banquet of the kingdom not because he was good. He became good later when he involved himself in the party. He was converted when he found out that God loved him even though he was an impure, poor, small, indeed, precisely because he was small.
The discovery of this disinterested love was the light that dispelled the darkness that enveloped the life of Zacheus and made him realize that only love and giving away (sharing) are the sources of joy.

Indebted to Fernando Armellini SCJ for textual analysis

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