24th Sunday - God Forgives Those Who Forgive Others

 

God forgives those who forgive others.

The first reading threatens us with judgment, if we seek vengeance; it states, “The vengeful will suffer the Lord’s vengeance, for He remembers their sins in detail. Forgive your neighbor’s injustice; and then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven. Can a man nurture anger against another, and expect healing from the Lord?”

We should therefore, not be revengeful, but forgive; not nurture our anger, but pray; and we can expect peace and joy and the healing of our heart from Our Blessed Lord.

The Responsorial Psalm, reminds us to imitate the Lord in mercy and forgiveness. "The Lord is kind and merciful; slow to anger and rich in compassion." He forgives our sins, redeems us from destruction, and crowns us with kindness and compassion. Our Lord is mercy itself and always desires to forgive, and is always kind and full of compassion. It is us who block His mercy, by our lack of forgiveness toward our neighbor.

In the Gospel, St. Peter wondered, “How many times we must forgive others”. He was familiar with rabbis, who stated that a person should forgive, up to three times, but should not forgive the fourth time. Peter knew the number “Seven” was the "perfect number". And, so He asked if a person should be forgiven up to 7 times, thinking he would outdo the Rabbis. He thought, that to forgive 7 times, was something very great. However, Jesus replies, No; make that seventy seven times! He meant a limitless number of times. Since God is infinitely merciful, we must forgive without limit and so imitate God’s mercy and compassion for us.

Jesus then tells the parable of the man, who was forgiven a huge debt, but later would not forgive a much smaller debt, owed to him by one of his servants. Since he had not forgiven, as he had been forgiven, Our Blessed Lord states, he would be handed over to the torturers, until he paid his last debt. He said, “So will His heavenly Father do to you, unless each of you forgives your brother from your heart.”

In the Lord’s Prayer we pray, “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Our forgiveness from God is therefore, dependent upon those whom we forgive. If we do not forgive those who hurt us, we will not receive God’s forgiveness. To forgive from one’s heart often requires true faith.

Forgiveness does not mean, we forget the injustice or need to have a relationship with the person who hurt us. Forgiveness is an act of the will. When we forgive, we are saying, “I forgive. I want the person who hurt me to repent and change their life. I want the person to go to heaven.” Sirach said, “Could anyone nourish anger against another and expect healing from the Lord?” Rather, he said, we are to “Forgive your neighbor’s injustice; then when you pray, your own sins will be forgiven.”

Frequently, we are offended by the most trivial things—such as a lack of gratitude, a sharp word, in a moment of weakness. Someone we love, becomes angry, and says something they do not mean. At other times, we can become upset from serious causes too, such as one who threatens divorce, or families who suffer from an alcoholic, and so have to repeatedly forgive, or families with serious strife, or those who suffer from abusive bosses or co-workers.

However, despite injuries, which we receive from others, St. Ignatius, who was martyred in the second century of the early Church, said, “Meet their angry outbursts with your own gentleness; Their boastfulness with your humility; Their revilings, with your prayers, Their error with your constancy of faith; Their harshness with your meekness. Let us prove ourselves, ( as) their brothers, through courtesy. Let us strive to follow the Lord’s example and see, who can suffer greater.”

These words sound beautiful, but all of us know how difficult it is to be meek, humble, and gentle, and strive to follow the Lord’s example. Our Lord’s most splendid example to forgive comes from His forgiveness of all of us, who by our sins, crucified Him. Our Divine Lord is always ready to forgive everyone. Our power to forgive comes from Christ’s love and forgiveness on the Cross. His glorious last words on Calvary, “Father forgive them, they know not what they do.” gives us strength to forgive, and gives the antidote to heal the wound. The antidote is to pray for those who hurt us; to truly believe they did not know what they are doing; and to ask God to forgive, those whom have hurt us.

St. Francis of Assisi’s also speaks of these things within his prayer to God with regard to the Our Father, he said, “Forgive us our trespasses’ through thy unspeakable mercy, through thy merits of thy passion and death of thy most dearly beloved Son, through the intercession of the Holy Virgin Mary, and all the saints. As we forgive them that trespass against us; grant us the grace that we may sincerely and truly forgive our enemies, and pray earnestly to Thee, for them, that we may never return evil for evil, but seek to do good to those who injure us.”

If we find ourselves with an unforgiving heart, let us seek the Lord’s mercy through the Sacrament of Confession. In the words of the late Pope John Paul II, he said,“Just as the Lord is always ready to forgive us, so we must always be ready to forgive one another. And how great is the need for forgiveness in our world today—indeed in our communities and families, in our very own hearts! That is why the special sacrament of the Church for forgiveness, the Sacrament of Penance, is such a precious gift from the Lord. In the Sacrament of Penance, God extends His forgiveness to us in a very personal way. Through the ministry of the priest, we come to our loving Savior with the burden of our sins. We confess that we have sinned against God and our neighbor. We manifest our sorrow and ask for pardon from the Lord. Then, through the priest, we hear Christ say, to us: “Your sins are forgiven; Go and do not sin again”. Can we not also hear Him say to us as we are filled with His saving grace: “Extend to others seventy times seven, this same forgiveness and mercy.”

Let us ask Our Lady, the Blessed Virgin Mary, for a large and forgiving heart, like Her own. She will help us pray for those, who hurt us; She will help us avoid brooding over our injuries; Not return evil for evil; She will ask God to forgive those who hurt us; She will give us the understanding, that they knew not what they were doing; She will draw us to Her Son’s font of mercy in the sacrament of Penance; And She asks Her Son to help us to forgive, as we have been forgiven.

And when we go to meet our maker, we will have great confidence and trust in Our Lord’s words of His Sermon on the Mount, “Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.”