We live in a world where human failure is a fact of life, and some of those failures are uncorrectable.
Try to imagine what this world would be without a working, functioning principle of forgiveness.
The fact is - None of us can live or none of us can do anything with another person for very long without it becoming necessary for one of us to forgive the other. We all make mistakes. And sometimes we are even deliberately unfair or maliciously unkind to others. At that point - forgiveness becomes an absolute necessity.
Think about these: How could a married couple make a success of marriage without a willingness to forgive and be forgiven? It would be impossible. How could two people build a friendship and sustain it across the years without a working principle of forgiveness. That would be impossible.
How could a father and mother raise children and keep family together - without constant use of forgiveness. The answer is simple and absolute – they could not. All human relationships would be virtually impossible without forgiveness… without the healing touch of forgiveness.
Here is the greatest irony of all: We cannot even live with ourselves unless we are willing to forgive our own sins and weaknesses. All of us have made uncorrectable mistakes. We have said and done things we are not proud of. We cannot unsay or undo them. We cannot entirely forget them. The only thing we can do is forgive them, and that is not easy but it is absolutely necessary.
None of us can ever be a whole and healthy person until we have learned to forgive ourselves.
All of us are sinners, even the ones we perceive to be saintly people. That leaves God two choices: God can either destroy us or he can redeem us.
Human nature being what human nature is, fallen and broken - if God is going to work with us and relate to us, God must preserve the principle of pardon or forgiveness.
Not that God owes it to you or to me or to anyone. It is just that there is no other way for God to relate to us and work with us… except with mercy. Grace is getting what we do not deserve; all is grace; everything is by the grace of God. Mercy is not getting the punishment we deserve. That is how God relates to us.
In other words - What else could the Lord do with human iniquity besides pardoning it?
We are all sinners, enslaved by sin and we cannot redeem ourselves and so we need a Savior. So, God has stepped in and wiped the slate clean in Christ Jesus. He has forgiven us. Nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus, our Lord. (Romans 8:39)
Now, in turn – we are all called to do for one another what God has done and continues to do for us. Just as we have been forgiven, so must we forgive. And we will never get through with that. We will always need forgiving, and we will always need to forgive. Forgiveness is a fact of life and it is absolutely necessary.
As we heard in the Gospel acclamation: (2 Cor 5:19)
God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.
Why should we forgive at all? To mention just two very definite answers to that question.
First, we should forgive because we need forgiveness ourselves. As we pray in the Our Father as the Lord has taught us – Jesus included “forgive us as we forgive those who sinned against us…” or “trespassed against us”.
As much as we have been forgiven in the past and as much as we will need forgiveness in the future, we have no right to place a limit on our forgiveness of others.
Secondly - We should forgive because if we do not forgive, it will hurt us more than the one who hurt us. Not to forgive is like an infection – in the soul – spreading poison through the entire life. The person who refuses to forgive inevitably becomes sour, cynical and sad.
The process of forgiving is fulfilled when you can want or desire good for the person who has wronged you instead of wishing evil to fall upon him or her… The good of the person then will be your intention for reconciliation, as we heard in our readings today, to help the person grow and become a better person… not to get even.
Then you can say you fulfilled the commandment “Love your enemy”.. “Love your neighbor as you love yourself” because love – true love is willing the good of the other… even if the person is unloveable.
The problem is: when we come before God for our sins, we ask for Mercy but when it comes to other people’s sins or faults against us, we demand justice.
If you cannot forgive, maybe you need to examine your own relationship with God and your own experience of forgiveness, of being forgiven.
As Thomas Merton said: “We are not at peace with others because we are not at peace with ourselves, and we are not at peace with ourselves because we are not at peace with God.
Forgiving someone falling short of our expectations does not mean glossing over sin, or justifying it - but it DOES mean always trying to treat people with the respect and honor they deserve as beloved children of God – as our brothers and sisters in Christ who have great dignity in God's eyes.
Admittedly – all these are much easier said than done. On our own, it is impossible… but by the grace of God – everything is possible.
Mercy is not about pretending that something has not happened, that sin does not matter.
Mercy is about accepting to love as one is… as God is LOVE.
God created us in His own image and likeness - which is LOVE - and so our very nature is to love.
As we heard in the second reading from St. Paul’s letter to the Romans:
“Brothers and sisters: Owe nothing to anyone, except to love one another”.
I will close with this story which some of you may have heard before but it is fitting:
There was this man who saw a scorpion floundering
around in the water. He decided to save it by
stretching out his finger, but the scorpion stung him.
The man tried again to get the scorpion out of the
water, but the scorpion stung him again.
Another guy nearby told him to stop saving the scorpion that kept
stinging him.
But the man said:
"It is the nature of the scorpion to sting.
It is my nature to love. Why should I give up my nature to love
just because it is the nature of the scorpion to sting?"
Meaning -
Do not give up loving.
Do not give up your goodness.
Even if the people around you sting.
God bless…
