Dear Brothers and Sisters,
The psalm response helped me a lot to hear again that the Lord is compassionate and merciful. The essence of God is to be merciful. How is that mercy manifested to us? He is slow to anger and abounding in kindness. He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor does he punish us for our crimes. He throws our sins, our transgressions far from us. God is not a judge or a tribunal but one who is fully understanding and patient.
It is a good moment to think of our sins. Think how at times you destroyed someone. Sin is not just something the priest says not to do. Sin kills us; it is like a poison. And did you realize that you don’t have to pay for your crimes? You always consider yourself the innocent one and it is the other who is guilty. The Lord has compassion for his children no matter who we hurt with our thoughts and our adulteries. Our Lord has tenderness towards those who fear him.
The essence of God is mercy. That is why the gospel says, be merciful as your father is merciful, because only God can be merciful. You can be merciful if God dwells in you. You have been created for this. You are made in the image and likeness of God. This mercy is inside of us, but it becomes hidden and overshadowed by our sins, by our idols, by our inability to love the other one, by original sin, which is to love only ourselves. As time passes, we are always looking for that love. We say love me, love me, love me. This is original sin.
Mercy is the nucleus of this gospel. A Christian is called to love everyone. He is called not just to put up with them, but to love them. A Christian loves the enemy and that is something only a Christian can do. Others can love those who love them. They can love their mothers and their spouses and their children. A Christian is called to something different. He is called to love the enemy. An atheist can be faithful to his wife and stay married for fifty or sixty years, but only one who has Jesus Christ can love the enemy. They cannot do it and even you cannot do it, and you are in the Church.
The gospel says love your enemies and do good to them…and you will be children of the Most High. If you don’t love the enemy, you will not be a child of God. The gospel shows us Jesus Christ. He turns the other cheek; he doesn’t repay evil with evil. He loves those who crucified him. When they take his cloak, he gives them his pants as well. It is not just Jesus who does this, but all the saints and martyrs live in this way.
In the first reading we see that David has an opportunity to kill Saul who is trying to kill him, but he loves him instead. David is a man who has committed adultery and murder; he is a liar and experienced in evil and yet he can love the enemy. This is the essence of what it means to be a Christian. To be a Christian is not to pray a lot or to go to Mass every day. These are good things to do and they help us to be Christian, but they don’t mean that we are one.
A Christian can understand his/her spouse and have compassion for him and be merciful with his shortcoming and defects. The mercy of God is absurd; there is nothing equal in this world. It is laughable. God is crazy to be so forgiving. Should he not demand that we change, should he not do justice to those who deserve it? This is what the world calls us to be. However, Jesus is the Lamb of God, not the wolf and we are called to like him, to be a lamb. This can only be done if we have Christ within us. A follower of Christ is a lamb, not a wolf.
Christ wants to enter us through the preaching, through the Word, through the sacraments, through the Eucharist, through the poor who are in need of something. When you have the spirit of Christ you don’t crush the other one who did an injustice to you. You don’t sue your brother who took the inheritance; you don’t retaliate when someone speaks badly of you or hurts you or a loved one. To be a Christian is not to demand anything, even your life. It does not make any sense but when you have the spirit of Christ, you are very happy, even with cancer or being broke or living alone. This is why we say it is impossible to do this with your efforts. It is not in our nature. We need the spirit of Jesus Christ.
Have you noticed how tender God is with you. He is like a mother with a newborn child. This is how God is with you. Let us ask the Lord to give us this grace to be a Christian, to be a lamb and experience this love.