Dear Brothers and Sisters,
I liked very much one of the gospels this week where Jesus takes the blind man aside, leads him out of town and puts some spittle on his eyes. This is not what he usually does. And he does the same to us each Sunday; he takes us away from the ordinary things and puts a little spittle on our eyes to help us to see. To see what? His love for us. Jesus asks the man can you see? And he responds, the people look like trees walking around. Maybe Jesus wasn’t at his best that day and had to do another miracle to help this man to see. Or maybe he is telling us that we need more spittle, or grace, to see ourselves truly, deeply. We are not cured of our blindness all at once; it takes many years. After he touches him a second time, he sees perfectly. Our sight improves, brothers and sisters, as Jesus takes us aside and gives us his light and his grace. We see ourselves much more clearly than last year or last month. This is a process that lasts a long time.
If you come today sad or anxious or preoccupied, you can rejoice because the psalm says that Jesus takes our sins and throws them as far as the east is from the west so that we cannot see them. Someone said it is like rewinding our life to the point when we are about to sin, and then he helps us not to; he makes us a new man or a new woman. He doesn’t treat us as our sins deserve. It is a beautiful psalm to read and think about. How many gifts has God given us? We should make a list and look at it often.
Jesus makes a point I never noticed before; he says, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that you may be children of your Father.” To be a child of God, I need to love my enemies. It doesn’t matter how many Masses I attend or rosaries I say or how tolerant I am. What really matters is that I love my enemies! Your enemy is not far away from you; he or she might be in the same bed or the same house or the same family or community. We are called to love as Christ did from the cross; he loved and forgave those who killed him.
It is always curious to see kids and how they resemble their parents. Some look like the father, others like the mother, and some are a mix. The gospel is saying to us that we resemble the father if we love like he does. If we are a Christian, then we would look like the Father in some way, in a very particular way. The essence of the Father is to love. God is love. God doesn’t love; He IS Love. It is not a sentimental love but something much deeper and purer. He doesn’t just love the good ones, but all of us.
His love is revolutionary, not in the sense of communism or socialism. To love the one who steals from you, who kills you or does an injustice to you is revolutionary. It is not a demand that God is making of us. It is a promise. This is the good news! The first reading says, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Be holy as I am holy. You will be holy not because you are good, but because God is good. It is not an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, which limits the damage we can do to the other. God’s love is not a class struggle. To love the enemy, love the one who humiliates you, is revolutionary! It is a promise he makes to all of us. Jesus Christ is the one who will fulfill this so we can relax. We cannot do this. But if Christ is in us, we can. Don’t take away his glory; he will do it, not you or I.
Has Christ repaid evil for evil? On the contrary he repays our evil with love. When we kill him with our sins, he gives us back our life. Mel Gibson depicts this very well in his movie, The Passion of the Christ. Only his hand appears in that movie. The hand that nails Jesus to the cross is his hand. He is making the point that his sins are responsible for nailing Jesus to the cross. It is my selfishness, my love of money, my adulterous glances that nails him. He understood this perfectly well, and I hope he understands it now.
Like St. Paul says I am running in order to reach the goal. And at some point he says, it is no longer I who live but Christ who lives in me. When we have Christ we can defeat death, we can love the enemy, we can be a saint. Relax, the Lord is the one who will do it in us. Be perfect as your Father is perfect doesn’t mean you will not sin but that you can be a son or daughter of God. You will have your weaknesses but you will be able to love like Christ. Perfect love is love of the enemy.
In South America they made a square and a monument for the women who were abused by the paramilitary. Thousands of them suffered in this way. A priest heard one of the women speak at the inauguration of this monument. She said, “I am not going to forgive, because I don’t want to!” It made deep impression on him. What was done to these women was something horrible but in the end the one who does not forgive suffers more. She is the one who pays, not the person who did the injustice, no matter if it was a parent or sibling or neighbor. She is the one who suffers and the Lord wants her to be free, to be at peace; it is a promise he makes to all of us. He will fulfill it, if you ask him and let him in.