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September 17, 2023Reflection for 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time:
Sirach 27:30-28:7:
This brief passage is a powerful mandate for us to give up grudges, unbridled anger and refusal to forgive others’ transgressions against us. Recall that in the “Our Father,” we ask God to forgive us… “as we forgive those who trespass against us!” By our own words, we are bound. God will forgive us, with the same level of generosity and mercy, which we extend to others. This isn’t a request; it’s a promise… that we’ll be rewarded with the same mercy that we give away. We need to and must contemplate this seriously! It helps to pray that God will fill us with God’s own Love, Mercy, Compassion and Understanding/Wisdom. With these graces, we’ll be able to forgive, and be forgiven… much more fully and completely. Forgiving others frees our souls from tension and turmoil that accompany grudges and bitterness. A forgiving person is a happy and peaceful person.
Psalm 103: “The Lord is kind and merciful, slow to anger and rich in compassion.” Let’s start by pondering this antiphon. Let’s pray to be transformed to be more like the Lord: kind, merciful, compassionate and slow to anger. To become less quick to anger, let’s pray to become more humble. Humility can come to us more genuinely when we’re made more aware of our own faults and imperfections. Learning of our faults can be painful, but it surely helps us to forgive others for their mistakes and sins that wound us. With true humility, we also become more aware of our honest strengths; and hopefully become more grateful to God for the skills and graces that God has given us. Counting our blessings also helps us to be more charitably merciful to others… even to those who’ve hurt us.
Romans 14:7-9: If we’re contemplating on how to cultivate grace within ourselves in order to forgive others, then this passage might, at first, not seem to “fit.” However, upon further pondering, it’s very relevant, in its reminding us that we live and die; not for ourselves, but for the Lord. If we just focus on ourselves; we can get too selfish and self-preoccupied to such a degree that we lose compassion and patience with others; graces we need in order to forgive them. Our calling as Christians demands that we humble ourselves to become conduits or “wells” of God’s love, mercy and forgiveness. To become true Christian disciples, we must “leave all,” including not just our possessions; but all hatred, grudges and yearnings for revenge. Giving up these “burdens” isn’t a loss… but a great gain! We gain freedom and peace by letting go of our preoccupations with wounds from past conflicts.
Matt 18:21-35: As we all know, it’s difficult to forgive and “move on,” in life when others’ offenses against us go unresolved, especially when they make no effort to make amends. Then, we feel outraged, as we feel that we’re not receiving the respect or “repayment” that we deserve. Jesus offers a story about a “king,” Whom we can see represents God; settling accounts with His “servants,” representing us. The “debts” of the servants represent our debts to God; or the punishment or consequences due to us, because of our sins.
Jesus describes “The King,” (God) as an all-loving, compassionate and infinitely merciful ruler and master; but He’s also just and fair. We’re warned that, like the King, we must, be humble, generously merciful, forgiving and compassionate, ourselves if we want to receive God’s mercy. How merciful our God is! Let’s follow God’s example!
Deacon Matt
