Twenty-fourth Sunday Ordinary

Twenty-Fourth Sunday Ordinary
September 11, 2005

"Remember the Most High’s covenant, and overlook faults." (Sirach 27:30-28:7).."Lord, if someone sins against me, how often must I forgive?" (Matthew 18:21-35)

Jesus responds to the question about how many times one must forgive offenses. Not the seven times required by the Torah, but "seventy times seven", i.e. Infinitely. To make his point he tells the story of the King who forgives a huge debt and the servant, the beneficiary, who proves to be selfish and vindictive with a fellow servant who owes him a fraction of what he himself was forgiven. The King is the Most High; we are the servants. The selfish servant was eventually brought to justice the hard way, a lesson for all of us when we think and act in similar ways.

This principle of endless forgiveness can be misapplied. When we or others are being misused or abused we have a responsibility first to do all we can to make sure it stops. Only then can the often slow process of forgiveness begin. Forgiveness does not happen just because we say the words. It happens when we acknowledge how we have been offended, say it clearly to the offender and engage ourselves in the process of letting go of the hurt emotionally The greater the hurt, the longer it takes. Sometimes it takes a lifetime.

This teaching is not only a principle of personal spirituality. It is the way things are in the kingdom of God in contrast to human kingdoms where the power politics of "get what you can by whatever means necessary" and "exact retribution swiftly and surely" prevail. It was precisely this kind of subversive teaching which got Jesus and many of his disciples brutally executed. Whenever we pray "thy kingdom come" we are taking this subversive position about the rules which prevail in our secular systems of politics and economics. We are clearly declaring that we are committed to what Jesus, the prophets before him and the disciples after him taught. The roots of our tradition are unambiguous: compassion and forgiveness must prevail in public and private life.

We have seen in recent days in New Orleans how quickly the rule of law can disintegrate into chaos and violence. First we had to stop the violence before the repair work could begin. We have a seen how compassionate and generous people can be in the face of human suffering. We do have a choice about how we react to the difficulties of others. We are given many chances to forgive as we have been forgiven by the Most High. But the time available for compassion is not endless. Eventually the opportunities run out and the servants will be face to face with the King. The birth pangs of the kingdom of God are long, painful and intermittent, but sooner or later it will be with us in its fullness.