What pronouns do you use when you pray?

“Two people went up to the temple area to pray; one was a Pharisee and the other was a tax collector” (Luke 18:10).

In Leviticus 23:26-32, we read that the Jews are required to fast once a year. The Pharisee in today’s parable multiplied this command more than a hundred times: “I fast twice a week.” Deuteronomy 14:22-23 prescribes that the Jews give a tenth of what their fields produce to the Lord. Our Pharisee based his offering not only on what he harvested but on everything he earned: “I pay tithes on my whole income.” This Pharisee went way over and way beyond what was expected of him. So why was he the “bad guy” in the story?

It was because of all his I’s: “I fast twice a week, and I pay tithes on my whole income.” The Pharisee probably thought he was able to do all this on his own. He did not say, “Thank you, God, for giving me the grace to desire to be generous and the necessary resources to live out this desire.” In fact, when he did thank the Lord, he only brought the focus back to him: “O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity.” Prayer is supposed to be a dialogue with God. Can what the Pharisee did in the temple be considered prayer? Yes — a distorted kind of prayer. As the words of our Gospel today reveal, the Pharisee “spoke this prayer to himself.”

Let us pause a while and ask ourselves this question: “What pronouns do we use when we pray?” We should not take out the I’s in prayer. For prayer to be real, we need to tell the Lord, “I did this… I need that… I feel this… I think that….” But does our prayer end just with the I? Does our prayer have space for the Thou?

Let us turn now to the other pray-er in our parable, the tax collector. Too often, we are quick to caricature all tax collectors as mired in sin. The Jews considered them traitors because they worked for the Romans who had subjugated Israel. The way many tax collectors earned a living was by padding the amount the Jews had to pay. In effect, they were extorting money for personal gain. But couldn’t there be good tax collectors?

We will meet one next Sunday when we listen to the story of Zacchaeus (see Luke 19:1-10 for a preview). When Jesus comes to Zacchaeus’ house and people grumble about Jesus associating with sinners, Zacchaeus says, “Half of my possessions, Lord, I give to the poor and if I have extorted anything from anyone I repay it four times over.” The English translation you will hear next week presents this statement in the future tense: “I will give… I will repay….” But the original Greek has it in the present tense: “I give… I repay….” This is not something that Zacchaeus will start doing because the Lord has visited him. This is something that Zacchaeus is already doing – here we have an example of a good tax collector!

Maybe the tax collector in our story is just as good. You might say, “But his own words condemn him! He says, ‘Be merciful to me, a sinner.’” But I say, “When one realizes and recognizes that he or she is not perfect, when one admits and accepts that he or she has done wrong, is this not a sign of goodness?”

The tax collector went home justified; the Pharisee did not. In the Bible, one way of understanding being “justified” is being in a right relationship with the Lord. And what is the “right relationship” with the Lord? It is a relationship of fear. Yes, you read that right. FEAR! But this is fear in the biblical sense. The fear of the Lord, especially in the Wisdom books, is not the same as being scared by a ghost or being frightened by punishment. The fear of the Lord is more about awe and wonder and knowing where you stand. This is why the fear of the Lord is one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. This is why in the books of Proverbs and Psalms, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (see Proverbs 9:10 and Psalm 111:10).

We see another example of the right way of understanding the fear of the Lord near the end of the book of Job. Many think that Job is a perfectly righteous man. After all, in the midst of all the suffering he experienced, he only said, “The Lord has given; the Lord has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord!” But if you read the book of Job to the very end, you will see that at one point, Job complains. Job, is convinced of his goodness and says in chapter 29: “I put on righteousness, and it clothed me; my justice was like a robe and a turban. I was eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame. I was a father to the needy, and I championed the cause of the stranger.” In this short chapter, Job uses “me,” “my,” and “I” more than 40 times. Does this sound familiar? And even before this chapter, Job already challenges God to explain himself and expresses the desire to face God in court so he can prove his righteousness (see Job 9).

Towards the end of the book of Job, God does appear in front of Job. But God does not answer the question of why Job suffered. God talks about a lot of things, but God skirts the issue. Still, after God’s speech, Job can only say, “I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know... I despise myself, and repent in dust and ashes” (Job 42:3,6). Does this sound familiar? It is the tax collector saying, “Be merciful to me, a sinner.”

What happened that changed Job’s attitude? As Job says, “I had heard of you by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees you” (Job 42:5). Though God did not really answer Job’s complaints, God’s mere presence strikes Job with awe and wonder — the fear of the Lord. And Job is dumbstruck and awestruck because there is God in front of him. And this is my interpretation now: Job sees God totally lovestruck with him, and Job feels unworthy.

I think this is what the tax collector also experienced. In front of Holiness, the tax collector felt all the more unholy, and so he could not understand why the All-Holy, All-Powerful, and Almighty would give him the time of day and, much more than that, give him love — which is the other word for mercy. The tax collector was humbled as God exalted him.

We, too, can have the same experience in prayer if after all our I-this and I-that, we look up from the squalor of self-absorption and just behold God before us as a real though mysterious Thou. We will not always be able to know or understand this God, but God’s presence is better than all knowledge and understanding. Though we will feel we have to stand at a distance, God’s only desire is always to draw closer to us. Let us be dumbstruck and awestruck at this God Who is lovestruck with us.