Our Lord gives us a rather striking picture today: men carefully measuring out tithes on mint and herbs while neglecting “justice and the love of God.”
The problem is not that they are too careful about religion. Jesus actually says, “These you ought to have done.” The problem is that they have become exact about the small things while missing the thing the small things were meant to serve.
You can polish the brass on the front door while the house is falling down behind it.
Religion can become like that.
We can be correct about practices, particular about details, able to tell other people exactly what they ought to be doing, and still allow pride, bitterness or lack of charity to settle quite comfortably in the heart.
That is why Saint Paul’s words to the Galatians are so useful. He does not ask whether they look religious. He asks what is actually growing in them.
He contrasts the works of the flesh with the fruit of the Spirit.
Jealousy, anger, rivalry, impurity, selfishness — these reveal something.
So do love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
Fruit tells you what sort of tree you are dealing with.
You do not need to stand beside an apple tree with a theological textbook wondering whether it is an apple tree. Eventually, apples settle the matter.
The same is true of Christian life.
The question is not: Do I know the faith? Do I keep Catholic customs? Do I say the prayers?
Those things matter.
But what are they producing?
Has years of receiving Holy Communion made me more charitable?
Has Confession made me more humble about the faults of other people?
Has prayer made me more patient?
Has knowing Christ made me easier to forgive, slower to anger, more truthful?
That is a much harder examination of conscience than counting mint leaves.
And Saint Callistus understood something important about this.
He became Pope in the early Church and was criticised by some precisely because he was willing to show mercy to repentant sinners while still defending the faith.
Mercy does not mean saying sin does not matter.
Saint Paul could hardly be clearer that some ways of living are incompatible with the Kingdom of God.
But neither does the Church exist to become a club for people who have never fallen. Christ came to save sinners.
The question is whether the sinner will repent, receive grace, and allow the Holy Spirit to produce something new.
Callistus himself eventually gave the final witness of his life as a martyr. The fruit of faith matured into fidelity unto death.
So the readings give us a very simple measure today.
Not: how religious do I appear?
But: what is growing in me?
If there is anger, impurity, resentment or selfishness, call it what it is and bring it to Christ.
If there is patience beginning where once there was anger, forgiveness where once there was resentment, self-control where once there was slavery to desire — thank God.
That is the Holy Spirit at work.
Christ does not want us merely to look tidy on the outside.
He wants the whole life to become fruitful from within.
