Scripture Readings: Book of Sirach 27:30-28-7; Saint Paul’s Letter to the Romans 14:7-9; Gospel According to Saint Matthew 18:21-35
The Gospel passage for this Sunday revolves around the question Saint Peter addresses to Jesus, “Lord, when someone wrongs me, how often must I forgive? Seven times?”
The question of Peter may appear almost humorous to us in its innocence, since we know well what Jesus taught and how we are to apply it in our daily lives. In other words, forgiveness is not about quantity, such as forgiving “seven times.” Rather, forgiveness is about quality, something to be extended always and everywhere.
According to the tradition and understanding at the time of Jesus, forgiving others was normally to be extended up to three times. Peter likely imagined his proposal was liberal and praiseworthy by suggesting forgiving up to seven times. In both the “three times tradition” and in the number Peter proffers, limits of human capacity are being taken into account. In other words, to forgive in greater numbers or at all times was something God alone could do.
However, the bottom line and the heart of the teaching of Jesus is that there is never an occasion when we must not forgive. It is a solemn expectation, and no reasonable or unreasonable number can be assigned to the duty of forgiving others. Expressed another way, the notion of vengeance is not a part of the Gospel path.
I’ve always liked the idea that Mark Twain stated, if I remember it correctly, but also adapting it somewhat. He said that we all need a sizable plot of ground in which to bury the faults or offenses of our friends and loved ones. That is what forgiveness is all about. We also hope and pray that others will extend the same largesse to us as well. But of course we can never live an other’s life, we can only live our own.
Our call and our obligation as followers of Jesus is to forgive always, promoting and preserving the unity and harmony of the community to which we belong.
Does this mean bypassing or ignoring the reality of truly offensive, illegal or immoral behavior? By no means. Such misdeeds need to addressed and dealt with, yet there can also a place for forgiveness when repentance is evident, or taking onto account mental or moral illness.
When we look for a model of continual forgiveness, we need only look to God, who forgives totally and absolutely. By God’s grace, the serious demand that we too forgive can become a reality. Merciful forgiveness should characterize our dealings with others, assisted by grace that is given by God, moving us to do good and avoid evil.
The king spoken of in the Gospel parable this Sunday represents God, whose forgiveness is absolute. A staggering debt is forgiven by the king, which reminds us of all that God extends to sinful humanity. By comparison, the offenses dished out to us by others are like mere drops of water in the sea.
Perhaps the prayer that best expresses the need to forgive is contained in the “Our Father,” formed by the Word of God and taught by our Savior’s command. The famous words “forgive us our trespasses are we forgive those who trespass against,” capture perfectly the teaching of Jesus intends for us to hear and put into practice.
In the “Our Father,” Jesus is teaching us that divine forgiveness depends on our own readiness to forgive. Even if others are not willing to forgive, we are called to do so.
Throughout his teaching, Jesus calls us to love one another as he loves us (see, for example, Gospel of John 23:34 and Acts of the Apostles 7:60). Our love is to be genuine and an expression of the one’s very self, from the heart, recounting that the heart in biblical terms is the symbolic source of one one’s desires, thought and human self-expression. Jesus expressed it thus: “Out of the abundance of the heart your mouth speaks” (see Matthew 12:34; Luke 2:35 and 6:45).
The sort of forgiveness we are being called to not something superficial or merely socially acceptable, such as, “We’re on speaking terms. Period.” Rather, Christian forgiveness is to flow from the “ongoing newness,” we might call it, of being a Christian. That doesn’t mean that forgiveness will be easy, but it remains the divine ideal to which we aspire.
To be able to forgive means being clothed with certain dispositions that enable us to love others. That means putting on “compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience,” as Saint Paul indicates in his Letter to the Colossians (3:12). He goes on to say: “You must forgive each other in the same way that the Lord has forgiven you” (3.13).
May we be committed to that as well.
Abbot Christian Leisy, OSB