Beloved brothers and sisters

In the first sentence of today’s Gospel, we heard how Jesus went to the Mount of Olives: a meeting place with his heavenly Father, a meeting place with himself, a place of isolation and silence, two necessary conditions for a full meeting. A place where God’s mercy embraces the merciful self and becomes merciful. A place of infinite horizon where there is no condition, no need, no circumstance in the relationship, but only the desire to stay and be alone.

The Mount of Olives is a place of grace, where pure, good oil is obtained to anoint the king, priest, and prophet, who represent submission and obedience only to God.

From this place, Jesus came to the temple in the morning: he went from seclusion to liturgy, to testimony, teaching, guidance, and application; he went from a relationship with himself to a relationship with others. And all the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. When the evangelist John used the expression „all people“, he wanted to express God’s deep desire that all God’s people should find a way to reach him. They would see in him the unity of heart and wisdom of this age.

By his statement: „he sat down and taught them,“ wanted to express his desire to show God’s closeness to his holy people, so he began to interpret the Scriptures to them, thereby supporting his statement in the Gospel according to Matthew: „ Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.“

While he was teaching them, the Pharisees and scribes, teachers of the law, came to him with a woman caught in adultery, brought her to Jesus and asked him to judge her according to the law of Moses, that is, by stoning. In this situation, when they told him “Teacher”, they recognized him as a teacher of the law, but they did not accept that he should teach them what to do in this matter, so they dictated to him what he should do. They did not realize that Jesus was the same yesterday, today, and forever, and his only need was to love.

He bent down to the ground and began to write with his finger. One of the church fathers compares this movement to the act of God creating man. In the description of creation in the Book of Genesis, God took dust from the earth, formed it, and created man, calling him Adam because he was taken from the earth. That is so that those Pharisees and scribes who stood before him may understand that you, the creatures, tell me, your Creator, what to do, and you want to kill a man, who is as much a creature as you, whose Creator I am. On what authority do you pass this judgment? Who created these rules that you practice?

This text is a sensitive and vital issue that is a daily theme of many people and cultures and represents a burning social problem, especially in our Middle Eastern societies and traditional religions. Jesus comes to solve this question by outlining a methodology for solving this problem, first by hearing the second community, accepting its social wound, and expressing the truth. However, the solution cannot be based on the law because the Law Lord is present here and now, and it is he who decides.

There was a great silence, and one by one they started to leave and left the woman alone in the middle of the square, in great sadness, confusion, wonder and with the thought: „ What will the teacher do to me? I wonder if he is like the teachers I met.“ It was enough that he looked at her to remove all doubt and confusion, and she felt, that this man is different from all men, and that his view of her draws her to a different value, because she is a woman different from all the values and views given to her by other men, when they look

Beloved, the sin of adultery that this woman represents is the reality of today’s weak, restless and suffering world as a result of the many wars that are taking place in more than 60 countries of the world. These are primarily internal civil wars caused by external interests.

Jesus comes here to tell the lords of this world and the great countries whose interests lead this world to war, destroy and kill thousands of defenseless people whom God created to live like the rest of humanity. By what authority do you rule these countries to live in conflicts, to kill and destroy towns and villages, and to deprive people of their right to life and to live in dignity? Why do we live in Syria, as well as in Ukraine, in your neighboring country, and in many other countries without water, electricity, food, health care, work, and a clean environment?

Today, as we meditate on this text from the Gospel of John, let us lift up our prayers and ask God that all men return to themselves in solitude and that every arrogant one, a proud and influential person in this world heard what the Lord Jesus said: „ Let one of you be without sin to throw a stone at her first.“

No one in this world has the authority to wage wars, kill people, relocate, and expel them. It is a disgrace to the world today that there are refugee camps in many places. If that suggests anything, it indicates the bankruptcy of our world in terms of justice, sound morals, and dignity, because the dignity of tyrants and leaders is derived from the dignity of their people.

Let us ask God to give true peace to the world by stopping all forms of armaments and the arms trade, which bring nothing but destruction and death, by halting all death sentences and torture in detention centers and prisons and stopping trafficking in human beings, developing means of peaceful dialogue, activating international justice, respecting human rights, the, freedoms of the individual and human dignity and by punishing countries and individuals who contribute to the humiliation of people and violate their rights and dignity.