But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, ‘You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, “We have Abraham as our ancestor”; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the axe is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Matthew 3:7-10

I rather like to use the word, “religious”, to describe my spirituality. For a while there, I was prone to use the word, “spiritual”. I was taught that religious people were like the Pharisees and Sadducees whose faith was bogged down with painstaking observances of rituals and works. Unfortunately, in time I realized that most so-called “spiritual” people have the same attitude and posture as the very people they criticize. It did not take much to conclude that changing the term around is not going to hinder us from becoming like Pharisees. I am not saying that we should not forego using certain terms especially the ones with derogative connotations. We cannot be so naive to believe that changing terms will automatically change attitudes. For this to happen, we need something more profound to occur in our hearts. John the Baptist warned the Pharisees that a mere splashing of water is not going to modify their attitude. They need to show fruit of repentance, another word often thrown about without much ponderation. Surely, John is not advocating a system of merits. He was preparing the world to receive the gracious gift of God. Therefore, what does he mean exactly by the fruit of repentance?

The worst thing we can do is reduce this to acts. There is no indication that John is saying we should do good works to show that we are truly repentant. This would be more in line with the spirituality of the Pharisees and other religious leaders of his time. They displayed their charitable works as evidence of their piety. This practice is still carried out. Many believe that charitable works will cover a multitude of sins. In many ways they do. People can tolerate tyrants and corrupt religious leaders if they see them giving a plate of food to a poor hungry soul. This is not the fruit of repentance but an appeal to sentimentality. In the same gospel, we can read Jesus had some harsh words to say about such actions. Good works should be done in a quiet manner without drawing attention to the deed itself. These words are very much overlooked and neglected in this age of social media.

In the streets, there are people who distribute food to the homeless. I am grateful for their actions. They are meeting a concrete need which we (Mary and myself) do not have the capacity to fulfill on a large scale. Most of the homeless including our children only get one complete meal a day. Furthermore, the homeless population is growing on a daily basis here. The demand is growing everyday. However, once a homeless person commented that the people distributing the food never hide their disdain towards them. At first, I was shocked by this comment. Then we saw it for ourselves. We still do not understand why someone would humiliate the very people they are serving. It never occurred to me that it is possible to do something good and at the same not acknowledge the humanity of the person who is on the receiving side. During this festive season, people often come to the streets bearing gifts. They distribute them to everyone especially the children. Then they take tons of pictures and after that, we never see them again until next Christmas maybe. All these are good actions but I doubt that these are the fruit of repentance.

My attitude towards the Pharisees and the religious leaders changed over the years. There was a time when I associated them with the other person. The ones I believed who did not follow or understand the teachings of Jesus unlike myself, of course. I did not realize that I was espousing the attitude of the Pharisee in my criticism of them. Today, I see the Pharisee as a mirror. I realize that they represent who I am or can become. After all they were people just like myself. Therefore, I have to imagine myself in their shoes and listen to the harsh words of John. What is my fruit of repentance? Just because we are in the streets with the homeless children does not automatically mean that we are bearing the fruit of repentance. Maybe most people might be impressed with what we do. The Pharisees liked it when they impressed people with their charitable acts. Our spirituality needs to be better that this!

A few weeks ago, I shared that we witnessed three consecutive acts of violence in a span of ten minutes. They disturbed us profoundly especially because one of the teens who committed the act has a close connection with us. Seeing him in this dark state made us feel a little repulsed towards him. It was hard for us to separate the deed from the person. I know these are harsh sentiments to harbor but we can not help our feelings. Last week, this same boy approached us and apologized. Well, he said that he was sorry that we saw this side of him. He tried to explain that he was going to buy a bicycle so that he can start working with food delivery. I know that his justification does not make any sense and he knows it too. However, it was obvious that he was appealing to us not to think of him as a monster or a hopeless case.

Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” Matthew 9:12-13

The world will consider this young man as a hopeless criminal at best or a monster at worse. We live in a harsh society. Many times people including the head of state made comments such as a good criminal is a dead criminal. In some instances people have told me that human rights are for righteous people. These things are said out loud without any reticence. In the act of baptism we symbolically die to the world. If we participate in this gesture without its implication taking root in our lives, then we are nothing more than the Pharisees of Jesus’ time. However, if we are willing to listen to the voice of our faith, then our baptism means we stop thinking and judging like the world. We are dead to its standards but now alive in the person of Christ. We espoused the Spirit of Christ and we bear the fruit. of this new lifestyle. This young man was asking us to be merciful to him. Not in the superficial manner but in genuine love. We found the incidents to be extremely disturbing because we know that this young man is much more than his actions. We told him that it made us sad when we saw him doing those things because we know that he is a much better person than his actions. He sat down next to us and was moved to tears. He knew that we meant it.

We realized that bearing fruit has nothing to do with proving our repentance but it is seeing these lost and abandoned children in a different light through the merciful eyes of the Good Shepherd. It benefits no one but ourselves. It helps us understand what it means to be in the gracious love of God.

For now, I will consider this as the fruit of repentance. Perhaps in the future I will discover more things about it. I am sure that our children and teens here are going to help us in the process and when they do, I will definitely pass this learning along to anyone interested.