If a child accidentally drops a dish, do you forgive them?
If they were warned again and again and still drop the dish, do you forgive them?
If a family member or friend did you wrong would you forgive them?
If they repeated the wrong would you forgive them?
And would it make a difference if the person who did you wrong was not family or friend, if they were enemy or other?
Injuries can come by accident; they also come, due to incompetence of those who should know better.
We expect a doctor to know medicine; an attorney to know the law.
Can you forgive the lack of knowledge in others, but not in those who have obligations to know?
Today’s liturgy calls all Christians, no one excluded, to forgive one another. Not three-times, nor seven-times, we are to forgive unconditionally and an unlimited number of times.
Depending only on Jesus for the strength and grace to do so.
Wow!
This is a difficult task, but necessary.
To forgive someone who has caused you much pain, suffering, and grief.
You and I know very well what this is like, we live this every day.
It is easy to consider mercy and forgivingness in the abstract. It is tough in the actual reality.
At times it is next to impossible.
How can we as human beings, living in the 21st Century accomplish this task?
Humanly speaking, we cannot forgive the unforgivable.
Humanly speaking we shall remember offenses, and perhaps seek vengeance.
But the second reading reminds us that we are not our own masters!
We belong to God! We are responsible to the Lord!
Therefore, we are called to go against human traditions and mere human inclinations.
We are called to put into effect in our lives the moral essentials of Jesus Christ.
In everything we think, say, and do, we are called upon to reflect that the Lord Jesus Christ is master of our lives.
When you forgive someone, you are saying that you know the other person is at fault.
But you have decided not to seek revenge.
You have given up any supposed right to retaliation.
By your forgiveness you help to release the other person from the wrong that he or she has done.
This is what God does for us, and is what we do for each other.
Forgiveness does not make the wrong right or remove the need for necessary correction.
It allows us to move on and grow closer to kingdom, which at times, is beyond our thoughts.
We must always have sympathy, care and support for the victim.
But somehow we must go beyond, to heal even those who have wronged us: “Love your enemies; Do good to those who hate you… that they may be children of your heavenly Father.”
If we forgive from the heart seeking a better way, improving and growing from the wrong that has taken place we all benefit. But if we harbor the wrong, it takes us down, and at times those around us.
The paradox is “Love is the answer,” love is the only House in this world large enough for all the pain and suffering. And love from the heart always forgives unconditionally, because the love is God.
Perhaps Mother Teresa says it best with the poem she engraved on the wall of her home, for children in Calcutta:
“People are often unreasonable, illogical and self-centered; forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives; be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies; succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you; be honest and frank anyway.
What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight; build anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous; be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow; do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough; give the world the best you’ve got anyway.
You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God;
It was never between you and them anyway."