Whatever your view of Gandhi, he was a man of profound thought who influenced millions. He was once asked about his view of Jesus Christ. His reply is rather devastating:

“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

That claim is sadly resonant. We’ve probably all encountered a Christian whose behaviour has challenged our faith in Christ and his Church. Even more certainly, our own behaviour has somewhere, some time, scandalised someone.

I don’t mean scandalised like ‘pass-the-smelling-salts I-think-I-might-faint scandal,’ which is a quaint relic of the past. Skandalon is the Greek work for “stumbling block.” It’s easy to imagine one’s bad temper, or lack of charity, or rank hypocrisy, becoming a stumbling block to another person’s faith in the truth and authority of Jesus Christ. As a young lawyer working in South Africa, Gandhi was scandalised by the racism he observed in men and women who called themselves Christians. Hence his devastating observation.

Pope Francis, it seems to me, invokes this tragedy often, when he rails against modern-day scribes and Pharisees in his daily homilies. I think it must underly his zealous emphasis on the mercy of God. He knows — as we all know — that there are millions and perhaps billions of people who seek a peace the world cannot give, but the scandalous witness of some Christians prevents them from approaching Christ. The pope’s solution, I think, is to preach the mercy of God in season and out of season.

In calling the Year of Mercy, he’s conscripting the rest of the Church to join his effort. Just as the behaviour of Christians can be a stumbling block to faith, so the behaviour of Christians can be a bridge to Christ; a channel of grace. The witness of the saints is proof enough of that.

What if every Christian corresponded with the grace pouring down from Heaven during this Year of Mercy, and became another face of the mercy of the Father; another Christ? This, I think, is the Holy Father’s noble vision for this holy jubilee. Hence his exhortation that we become familiar with the works of mercy, and practice them as often as we can.

I have suggested to my parishioners that conscientiously enacting each of the fourteen works of mercy constitutes a good Lenten discipline. To that end, I have distributed the attached document as an aid. Some of the illustrating examples are very good, and others are trite. But that’s good! It might motivate you to discern better applications proper to your context.

Kyrie Eleison.