Stumbling Into Reconciliation By Accident

Luke 16: 1-13 contains what is perhaps the most enigmatic parable in the gospels--the parable of the fraudulent manager.  What is surprising about the story is that the protagonist is a local manager of a large estate who has been caught defrauding his boss.  The local manager recognizes that after being terminated by his boss, he is going to need to rely on the goodwill of the locals, who all owe money to the boss.  So the manager negotiates a favorable settlement on all the debtor's accounts in order to gain their goodwill.  The master, rather than being infuriated at the local manager, applauds him for acting shrewdly.

This parable is an indictment about Israel's perception of its own holiness; particularly the arrogance of the religious leaders, and is a call to humility.  It is, by extension, an indictment about our own culture's perception of its holiness, and particularly the arrogance of religious leaders today, and a call to humility in the Church.  Notice that all of the characters in the story think of nothing but their own self interest; the local manager, the boss, and the locals who all owe the boss money.  This is a theme that runs through the parables of Jesus.  Jesus was calling on Israel, and particularly the religious leaders who had a very high opinion of themselves, to be humble.  Jesus is making the same message to the Church today.

The parable also suggests that when reconciliation occurs, it occurs despite our narcissism.  That is, we don't set aside our sinful nature and then bring about reconciliation with one another.  We remain narcissists, stumbling from one crisis to the next, and yet somehow, in spite of our narcissism, reconciliation happens.  In the parable, there is reconciliation between the boss and the local debtors, the boss and the manager, and the manager and the local debtors, all due to nothing but the actions of the manager that were brought about by his attempts to obviate the results of his own fraudulent conduct.  We don't become holy and then start doing good.  We strive to be holy but remain sinful and yet are somehow able to do good in spite of our sin.