St. Matthew has the has honour of being widely believed to be a reformed tax-collector and as such his disreputable past had somehow rubbed off on Jesus who came to be regarded with disfavour and even opprobrium because of this. That’s an honour which any followers of Jesus would rather not be saddled with. And yet, for all that this very reformation of a former taxman speaks volumes for the irresistible transforming influence of the Messiah. In Matthew the Beatitudes are strongly highlighted. Likewise, these very memorable words of Jesus: “For I was hungry and gave me food, thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me; I was naked and you clothed, sick and you visited me, imprisoned and you came to me.” In these enumerated acts of charity the Christian spirit is encapsulated best, even better than in the Parable of the Good Samaritan, although we know full well that comparisons are for the most part odious. (Echoed by the Pharisee’s words whom we might quote here as exclaiming self-satisfiedly as O DIYOS KO, SALAMAT NA LANG AT HINDI AKO KATULAD NG IBA D’YAN… Comparisons are ODIOUS.
Our town is named in honour of St. Matthew whose example of reformation we’d do well to emulate. To turn our backs on our discreditable past and for us to turn a new leaf in the light of a a glimpsed eternal “future” in the bosom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
For what other reason can there be in studying these saint’s lives? All hagiography should be our own biography and God’s working should be found in the details of our lives. Or, to paraphrase both Van Der Rohe and Robert Browning, what’s a Heaven for?
