We contemplate forgiveness this Sunday. Despite being one of the words most bandied about by Catholics, forgiveness is something that is particularly difficult to understand, because even though we wish to forgive, what do we do with the hurt that we feel when we are wronged, and the anger that boils up in our hearts when we think of that wrong?
To understand forgiveness, it is best to understand the basic formula of Catholicism: place God above all things. We cannot, we simply cannot, understand, and set right, our relationship with our brother, if we do not first understand, and set right things with, with God. Address God, first and all things will then flow aright.
In the case of forgiveness, we need to first understand that God forgave us first and it is this forgiveness that we imitate in our attempts to forgive our brothers. The great St. John Chrysostum teaches us:
He created us from nothing; he made the whole visible world for us, the heaven, the sea, the earth, animals, plants and seeds. I must be brief because of the infinite number of his works. Into us alone of all that are on earth he breathed a living soul. He planted a garden for us. He gave us a helpmate and set us over all the brute species, and he crowned us with glory and honor.
And yet, after all of this, after the Creator of all things allowed us the privilege to walk with him in the garden of paradise, what did man do? He disobeyed God and ruptured the relationship between God and man.
My dear brothers and sisters, from our own lives we all know that when trust is broken, it is very difficult to restore it. Look at those who live unchristian lives, a betrayal is very often the reason for them to swear a lifelong enmity. They look to destroy that person in any, and every, way they can. In such a context, if God had been like us, our punishment ought to have been the punishment intended for the servant in the Gospel:
a debtor was brought before him who
owed him a huge amount.
Since he had no way of paying it back,
his master ordered him to be sold,
along with his wife, his children, and all his property,
in payment of the debt.
We are in the debt of anyone who does good to us, and woe to us if we bite the hand that has fed us. And it was the hand of God that our first parents struck in their original sin!
And yet, Chrysostom points out:
when humanity turned out ungrateful toward its benefactor, he thought us worthy of an even greater gift—forgiveness.
Commenting on the Gospel today, St. Augustine points out that Our Lord’s reference to seventy times is not without significance, for in his gospel St. Luke enumerates seventy-seven generations between Our Lord, and Adam, our first father and the originator of sin. It was this original sin that Our Lord came to redeem us from, and thus, when He redeemed this sin, he redeemed seventy-seven generations!
It is to this perfection, then, that Our Lord Our Lord exhorts us:
Be perfect, … as your heavenly Father is perfect. (Mt. 5: 48)
He is asking us to be like Him, imitate Him. And this is precisely the point of the parable we read about in the Gospel today. The king who forgives the debt is a reference to God who forgives us our sins. Chrysostom once again points out that we should observe how generous God is; the servant asked only for an extension of time, but the king gave him more than he asked for, remission and forgiveness of the entire debt.
But none of this helps us to understand how we should forgive. Perhaps I can offer an example from my own life. I have been grievously wounded by a couple of people. When I think about it, my heart boils over with anger. I contemplate words I will say, to cut them down, or simply to defend, or protect, myself. Forgive them I want to, but my heart cannot fathom how to do so!
And then, the other day, at confession, the words of the confessor, “pray for them” trickled into my heart. While kneeling before the Blessed Sacrament I realized that whenever the angry thoughts related to these men come into my heart, I must stop immediately and pray, both for them, and myself. The words I use, and often recommend to penitents who come to me, are the second half of the Hail Mary:
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
And it does not have to be this prayer. Think of the words of Our Lord, when He was pinned in agony to the Cross:
“Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” (Lk 23:24)
For in truth, we do not know what we are doing when we hurt and wound someone through sin. We are casting our own mortal soul in danger of eternal fire if we do not repent.
The point of these prayers, is to plough our heart, repeating them over and over, so that eventually, whenever the anger bubbles up, it will automatically become a prompt to pray for that person, and ourselves. At that time, we will be able to say, I have forgiven him from my heart.
May Our Lord grant us the grace to forgive our brother from our heart.
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
Pray for us sinners,
Now, and at the hour of our death,
Amen.
(A version of this homily was first preached to the faithful at the parish church of Our Lady of the Rosary, Caranzalem.)
(Image reference: Our Lady of Sorrows, A. Lusson & L. Lefèvre, 1874 (?), Church of St. Laurent, Parish.)
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