Monday, September 25, 2017

THE FACE OF FORGIVENESS


                                                   Reflection for the 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A
                                                            (Sirach 27:30-28:7, Rm 14:7-9, Mt 18:21-35)
1.0.THE BURNING RAGE
Have you noticed that an angry person often justifies himself? And as his self-pity accumulates so does his rage accelerates. Anger burns like fire! It can explode or gradually melt. In either case, the angry person is the first victim. Physically, anger can trigger hormones in the body; affect heartbeat, body temperature, digestion, etc. It can distort sleep, induce ulcer or even lead to nervous breakdown. Anger is an emotional burden. It destroys prayer life and leaves us spiritually dry. It is contagious. If not checked, it can be an uncontrollable habit. We all get angry at some point, but no one likes to interact with an angry person. Anger spreads like a plague. Many families today are torn apart due to grudge and quick temper. And this grows into the larger society.

The first reading condemns anger in strong terms, “Anger and wrath, these are abominations, and the sinful man will possess them.” Here anger and grudge are seen as the fruits of sin. Sirach tells us that harbouring anger can be obstacle to receiving God’s forgiveness. “Forgive your neighbour the wrong he has done, and then your sins will be pardoned when you pray.” Forgiveness remains the key solution to anger.

2.0.   HARDENED HEART
In the Gospel of today, Jesus tells us the story of the unforgiving servant. When the servant begged for more time to pay the debt, his master treated him with great mercy and cancelled the debt. But on meeting a fellow servant who owed him far less than what he owed their master, he hardened his heart against the pleading of his colleague and locked him up in prison. The master was infuriated and said to him, “You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me; and should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?”
Here we can see that hardness of heart is the source of anger. A hardened heart is one not touched by God’s mercy, like the unforgiving servant. Such a one is ever hungry for mutual understanding and forgiveness but less ready to give such to others. Selfishness is at the root of it all. Nothing fuels anger like selfishness and pride. However, the real consequence of lack of forgiveness is not that we hurt others, but that we incur God’s wrath. “And in anger his lord delivered him to the jailers, till he should pay all his debt.” This Divine wrath appears to be directly opposite and proportional to Divine mercy. The difference is that the mercy was unmerited and given freely, but the servant incurred the wrath upon himself.

3.0.  THE FACE OF FORGIVENESS
The master was angry with the unforgiving servant, not just because he treated his fellow harshly nor because he lacked the capacity to forgive, but mostly because he failed to draw from the abundance of mercy shown him. Forgiveness can be difficult if we want to rely on our strength or disposition to forgive. Worse still, it can be an agonizing experience if we look at the ‘face’ of the offence or the offender as condition to forgive.
Forgiveness now has a face—the face of the Master! By cancelling the servant’s debt, the master showered him with supra-abundance of mercy, more than he could imagine. Since he ought to be sold, but set free, his current life should be lived as a gift. In other words, he ought to be overwhelmingly grateful to his master. Having been reborn in the master’s mercy, he ought to live it out. He was expected to forgive his fellow servant for this simple fact: the joy of what the master did for him. So, he ought to draw forgiveness from the master. Thus, the mercy of his master should become his reason to forgive.

Therefore, to forgive is an act of gratitude. The ungrateful cannot forgive! It’s a gesture of gratitude to God. Yes, we look upon the face of the Crucified and learn to forgive. We are expected to show mercy because we have received from His fullness grace upon grace (Jn 1:16). The second reading captures this forgiving attitude as living for Christ. “If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s (Rm 14:7-9). The supreme joy of belonging to Jesus Christ should lead us to let go of hurts, and look on them all as filth if only we can gain Christ (cf. Phil 3:8). “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Phil 4:13).
Forgiveness, located in Jesus, remains the authentic solution to anger. It brings healing and joy to the soul. Forgiveness is no longer what we imagine in our hearts or project in others. It is like rays of light illumining our hearts from the face of Jesus. He guarantees us of God’s mercy, and He empowers us to forgive others.

Fr. Jude Nwachukwu, C.Ss.R
National Shrine of Our Mother of Perpetual Help,
Ugwogo-Nike, Enugu, Nigeria.
17/09/2017.