Sunday the 18th of October 2026 - The Twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Isaiah 45:1, 4-6/ Ps 96(95) 1 Thessalonians 1:1-5b/ Matthew 22:15-21
When I was at primary school, a very long time ago now, we were taken to see a film called A Man for All Seasons. It is the story of Saint Thomas More. As Lord Chancellor of England, appointed by King Henry VIII, Thomas was the second most powerful man in the country but this did not save him from arrest, imprisonment and execution. A husband and father languishing in the Tower of London, all he had to do was sign an oath that his conscience told him he could not sign. His reported last words were that he died the king's good servant, but God's first. Thomas More, a man who paid his taxes, served his country, and obeyed its laws knew that when it came to the crunch his loyalties lay beyond the things of this world. We face the same question today from Jesus in the gospel.
The history of our salvation is divine, but it unfolds in human history. God does not save us from a distance, he works through kings, queens, and empires, through ordinary families and everyday communities. Each of us must navigate a spiritual life through a human life, as citizens of a civil society with its laws and regulations, while striving to keep the commandments of God. Sometimes those two loyalties sit comfortably together, sometimes they collide. The great band of martyrs bears witness to that collision. Even today, Christians in many parts of the world are killed because of their faith. The psalm continues the theme calling for the Lord God to be highly praised above all the so called gods of the nations.
The gospel today brings that tension to Jesus. The Pharisees, the scholars of their day, thought they had set the perfect trap. Was it lawful to pay tax to Caesar or not? If Jesus said yes, He would appear to acknowledge Caesar as Lord over God. If he said no, he would be a traitor to Rome. Either way, they thought they had cornered Him. Jesus, not answering directly turned the question back on them asking them to produce a coin which they did. Right there in the Temple precincts, these religious men were carrying money stamped with the likeness of Caesar. Jesus asked them who’s likeness and inscription was on the coin? They were obliged to say it was that of Caesar leading Jesus to tell them to render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s. Jesus did not tip the scale in either direction. Instead, he turned the question around and handed it back to them, and to us. Where do our loyalties lie? What are our priorities? He invites us to examine our hearts and answer His question honestly.
There is a deeper meaning surrounding the word likeness. The coin bears the image, the likeness, of Caesar. So give back to Caesar what bears his likeness. But what bears the image and likeness of God? In the first book of the Bible, the very beginning of scripture, we learn that it is we who are made in the image and likeness of God. We are the coins stamped with the likeness of our Creator. Caesar may claim our taxes, but only God can claim our hearts and souls.
The first reading is chosen for today because the prophet Isaiah tells us that God called Cyrus, a Persian king who did not even know Him, to free the Jewish people from exile in Babylon. Israel came to see that the one God was not merely their God, but the God of all nations. Creator of all, who rules even over pagan kings. God is Lord even over Caesar, our duty to the society we live in is real, but can never be ultimate. We should pay our taxes, vote, and contribute to the common good. Society needs believers to bring a conscience into public life. Health care, housing, protecting the vulnerable, the preservation of every human life from conception to natural death, all of these need us to bring them the influence of Christian ethics.
We pay taxes that sometimes fund things opposed to our beliefs. We cannot simply withhold them, but we can and must seek ways to influence and oppose how that money is spent. Our faith informs us and the Church teaches that when civil law contradicts the moral order, a properly formed conscience is obliged not to follow it. We will be judged under God's everlasting reign, not under any passing human one. Saint Thomas More said it simply as he went to his death, he died the king's good servant, but God's first. That kind of courage does not come from willpower alone. Saint Paul praised the Thessalonians for their work of faith, their labour of love, and their endurance in hope, but he is clear about the source, the Gospel came to them in power and in the Holy Spirit. Living for the one true God in a divided world is the work of grace given to us by the Holy Spirit.
The question for us today is this, do we have other gods? Money, respect, popularity, possessions, comfort, power. All of these make claims on the place that rightly belongs to God alone. We live in the world, but we are not of the world. When the two clash, we turn to God, even if it costs us a job, a friendship, our reputation, or in the extreme, our earthly life. As we bring the gifts of bread and wine to the altar let us place ourselves there as well. Give back to God the likeness he stamped on our souls. If the coin bearing the likeness of Caesar belongs to Caesar then we, bearing the likeness of God, belong to God.
Let us this week take one moment each day to ask what might be claiming that which truly belongs only to God? Then, as our opening prayer stated today, conform our will to His, and serve Him in sincerity of heart.
God Bless Brendan