24^th  Sunday in Ordinary Time (A); 9-13-20

Sir 27:30-28:7.  Ps 103.  Rom 14:7-9.  Mt 18:21-35

Deacon Jim McFadden

 

       Last week’s readings spoke of reconciliation.  This week we consider the same theme, but from the perspective of forgiveness.  We all know how difficult it is to swallow  our pride and say that we’re sorry when we have offended another.  But, it may be even harder to forgive when we have been offended personally or as a nation as we remember 9-11.  And, yet, we pledge to do exactly this everyday when we say the Lord’s Prayer:  “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against against us.” 

            Some would say that forgiveness is the distinguishing feature of Christianity.  But, today’s readings from Sirach shows that is not true.  Jesus’ admonition to forgive others comes from his Jewish tradition: “Forgive your neighbor’s injustice: then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven…Should a man refuse mercy to his fellows, yet seek pardon for his own sins?”  (Sir 28:2,4).

Sirach knew that wrath and vengeance can erode the spirit of the one harboring them.  When we’ve been deeply hurt, when trust has been broken, when expectations have been dashed, when someone failed to come to our help or defense, when we’ve been abandoned, when our reputation has been assaulted, anger may be the starting point as we seek to forgive others.  This anger may express itself in a seething reaction: it can go underground and hold its breath and become calcified in the form of resentment.  It can transform into more complex emotions of anxiety, stress, or depression which we try to escape through kinds of obsessions and addictions; many engage in self-medication, resulting in drug or alcohol dependency.  It can make it very difficult to have healthy relationships with anyone.  Unchecked, it can effect our bio-psycho-social-spiritual makeup, which makes it very difficult to have healthy relationships with anyone.

If we do not forgive those who have hurt us, then we are allowing ourselves to be possessed by an inner tyrant of rage.  Failure to say, “I forgive you,” holds us frozen in the past.  Dante, in The Divine Comedy, described those in the innermost ring of Hell as being frozen for all eternity.  An old Chinese proverb says that if a person cannot forgive, and opts for revenge, he should dig two graves—one for the offender and one for himself!

An incredible model of forgiveness happened in the Fall of 2007.  A deranged assailant entered an Amish school near Lancaster, PA , where he brutally killed five children and injured five others before killing himself.  The Amish community responded in a way that our vengeful society found surprising: they forgave the shooter.  David Kraybill, a sociologist at nearby Elizabethtown College and co-author of Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcends Tragedy, wrote, “I think the most powerful demonstration of the depth of Amish forgiveness was when members of the Amish community went to the killer’s burial service at the cemetery,” Kraybill says.  “Several families, Amish families who had buried their own daughters just the day before were in attendance and they hugged the widow, and hugged other members of the killer’s family.”

            Instead of denial/repression and anger/hatred, the Amish took what little they had left of their shattered lives and gave it to God, trusting that somehow He will help them make good out of it.  What the whole world saw was the simple message of forgiveness.  Such an act can only be done and sustained by following Jesus’ Third Way of mercy.

From the Christian perspective, emotional and spiritual health is found in a different and radical kind of attitude: the movement “towards people,” who are our brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus regardless of how they have treated us.  This entails forgiveness as necessary if we are to remain in right relationship with God; moreover, we seek reconciliation if that may be possible.  It is making a choice today based upon a past grievance, so that I can have a future relationship with the offending person.  This Way, which Jesus called the Kingdom of God is a movement towards quality relationships that are mirrored in Trinitarian love of giving and receiving of Life.  We can’t enjoy quality relationships with anyone, if we’re stuck in a relationship in which we are embittered, resentful, and unforgiving.

But how does one forgive a pedophile whose behavior  robs children of their innocence, possibly their faith in God, and undermines their chance for healthy intimacy?  How does one forgive a murderer who has snuffed out the life of a loved one?  And, will we ever be able to forgive terrorists who brutally attack innocent people?

Left to ourselves, we can’t.  The bottom line is that we need to pray for the courage and grace to engage in the process of forgiving someone who has hurt us.  The healing act of forgiveness is not possible without the saving grace of the Risen Christ.  His love prevents us from falling into the chasm of the darkness of stunted emotional death, or the raging fire of unresolved anger and hatred.  So, we go to Him and ask for the strength and courage to pray for the ones we need to forgive.  As we abide in Christ, our prayer changes our hearts.

The Lord Jesus, Whom we receive in the Eucharist, describes Himself as “The Way, the Truth, the Life” (Jn 14:5-6).  He challenges us to be the way of forgiveness, the truth of repentance, and the life of reconciliation.  We need to do so for our well-being and that of our society.  An act of forgiveness is immediately an act of compassion for ourselves and for the one who has harmed us.  Even the world of science and medicine is discovering the therapeutic benefit of people making peace where there has been hurt and resentment.  As the People of God, let us pray that we live out the deep riches and wisdom of this Way of Jesus, the Way of forgiveness.  Amen.