Readings:
Ezekiel 33:7-9
Psalm 95:1-2, 6-7, 8-9
Romans 13:8-10
Matthew 18:15-20

“Go and gain your brother”

In the Gospel Jesus says, “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.” Jesus says “brother,” and we hear in that word every brother and sister God has given us.

The first important word is not “sins” but “brother.” Jesus does not say, “If the sinner sins against you,” or “if your enemy hurts you.” Before the offense this person was your brother or sister, and after it he or she remains so. . This explains everything that follows: “If he listens to you, you have gained your brother.” The goal is not to win an argument or to prove I was right, nor to humiliate or expose what someone has done.

Immediately before this passage Jesus spoke of the shepherd who searches for the one sheep that has wandered away. Now one must go looking for the sister or brother who is lost.

We would normally expect the person who caused the offense to make the first move: “He hurt me; if he is sorry, he knows where to find me.” Jesus instead says to the one who has been hurt: “Go.” The wounded person is called to make the first move. This does not mean accepting abuse or pretending injustice has not occurred. It means refusing to let another’s sin have the final word over the relationship. It means to mirror how God treats us. Humanity did not first find its way back to God; God came searching for us.

Jesus then adds, “between you and him alone.” When someone hurts us we often speak to everybody except the person concerned: friends, relatives, colleagues, and often more sadly an entire online community. The original wound between two people becomes a wound involving many. Jesus begins with the smallest possible circle because even the one who has done wrong has a dignity that must be protected. The purpose is not exposure but healing.

If the other refuses to listen, Jesus gradually widens the circle: take one or two others, and eventually involve the community. There is tremendous wisdom and patience in this. Another chance is constantly offered, because the purpose remains the same: to gain the brother or sister.

Then comes the most surprising sentence: “If he refuses to listen even to the Church, treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector.” We can easily misinterpret this as: “Then reject him and have nothing more to do with him.” But we should ask: how did Jesus himself treat Gentiles and tax collectors? He did not approve everything they did, but neither did he cease loving them. He sat at the table with tax collectors and sinners; Matthew himself was called from the tax collector’s booth. Jesus did not wait for people to become worthy before loving them. His love always took the first step.

This is the kind of love to which he calls his disciples, a love that does not depend on being loved in return. Jesus loves even when his love is rejected, when he is betrayed, denied and abandoned. So even when a brother or sister refuses to listen, the disciple does not receive permission to stop loving. I cannot force anyone to reconcile with me. I can only continue to desire his or her good even when he or she gives me nothing in return. Not “I love you because you love me,” but “I continue to love you even when you give me nothing back.”

Jesus’ words about binding and losing belong to this same logic of reconciliation and forgiveness. God’s mercy is already offered, but mercy received is meant to become mercy given. We cannot celebrate being forgiven by God while making resentment the permanent law of our relationships. Correction without love becomes accusation; truth without love becomes a weapon; but love without truth becomes indifference because it stops engaging with reality and avoids the hard work of caring. Christian love holds truth and mercy together.

Then Jesus says that if two agree on earth, the Father will hear them. Matthew uses the Greek verb symphōneō, from which comes our word “symphony.” A symphony does not require every instrument to make the same sound. The violin remains a violin, the trumpet a trumpet, each with its own voice, but all following the same score. Christian communion is not uniformity. We can have different gifts, experiences and even disagreements, but the common score must remain love. This is also the spirit of synodality: walking together, listening to one another, and seeking in our different voices to discern the harmony to which the Spirit is calling us.

This brings us to the deepest promise: “Where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” Matthew begins his Gospel presenting Jesus as Emmanuel, “God with us,” and ends with “I am with you always.” Here, in the middle of his teaching on forgiveness and reconciliation, Jesus assures us again that he is in our midst.

So the great question is not simply who was right and who was wrong. The deeper question is whether the way we deal with our wounds, disagreements and sins allows the presence of Christ to become visible among us. Resentment, gossip and the refusal to seek reconciliation can hide that presence; truth spoken with love, mercy and the desire to regain our brother let the symphony begin again.

Let us play the symphony that will allow others to see the presence of God in our midst.

Fr. Enzo Del Brocco, CP