337. Nineteenth Thursday of Ordinary Time
Meditations no. 309 (unofficial computer-aided translation)
Our love for God is expressed in the way we practise charity.
There are no limits to the commandment of love left us by our Lord: You have heard that it was said, âYou shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.â But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. We have to love all mankind. If we really want to love and serve God, then we have to serve every human being. It can happen to us at times, as our Father has written, that it seems as if I hear someone saying to me: loving God above all things is easy, but to love oneâs neighbour, friends and enemies, now thatâs really difficult! However, if you really love God ex toto corde tuo, et ex tota anima tua, et ex tota fortitudine tua, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength, then that love for your neighbour which you find so difficult will be a consequence of the Great Love; and you wonât feel at odds with anybody.
We ought to examine whether our love for God, which aims to be true and perfect, is shown in specific acts of love for neighbour. That is essential if we are to be disciples of Jesus. He loved us so much that he gave his life for each of us. Because of Christâs love for all mankind, both for those who wish to serve him faithfully in spite of their shortcomings, and for those who donât wish to be his friends at all, he allows himself to be mistreated, insulted and crucified. Maiorem hac dilectionem nemo habet, ut animam suam ponat quis pro amicis suis: greater love has no man than this: that a man lay down his life for his friends.
When someone possesses Christâs own charity they donât worry whether they have already served others enough; they donât think about their own rights, tastes or preferences. This self-giving, this understanding, this charity, this forgetting about oneâs own rights, causes us to yield in everything that is ours, just as Christ Jesus did. Our Lord has told us to learn from him: discite a me, quia mitis sum et humilis corde (learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart). To acquire this meekness, this humility, this holy readiness to yield in everything personal, it is enough for us to contemplate Jesus, who semetipsum exinanivit formam servi accipiens, in similitudinem hominum factus et habitu inventus ut homo: he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.
You talk to me, our Father said, about the âhappy mediumâ. Be careful! For a person who wants to live a life of Love with a capital L, half-measures are feeble, they are miserly, they are mean and calculating. I will give you a piece of advice. When Love knocks at your door, donât throw up barriers or hold back your heart. Never be afraid of going too far. If we are generous to God, it will lead us to be generous to those around us, putting our heart into all that we do. The virtue of justice demands it of us: other people have the right to our understanding and our charity.
Our Lordâs teaching is that we have to forgive always.
The Gospel of todayâs Mass offers us a teaching of our Lordâs which we can meditate upon, in order to deepen in one specific expression of charity, namely, forgiving those who injure us.
The scene was Capharnaum. The afternoon was wearing on, and the conversation between the Master and the disciples seated around him flowed peacefully back and forth. At one point Peter asked: Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?
The strict interpretation given by the doctors of the Law was that one had to forgive just three times. Peter, who by this stage was beginning to learn something of the generosity which his Master was proposing, suggested a higher figure. Jesus looked at him and gently opened up to him unsuspected horizons: I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven.
The Masterâs teaching is clear: forgiving the offences of others has to be a characteristic of all those who wish to model their lives on the Gospel. That is why our Founder has always expected us to forgive right away, and from the bottom of our heart, anyone who has tried to do us harm.
Charity is seen in oneâs readiness to excuse and forgive. A contemplative soul, our Father said, is able to see Jesus Christ in every encounter, and doesnât find it hard to put up with the more trying aspects of othersâ personalities. It goes further: it would regard the phrase âto put up withâ as somewhat begrudging. What it seeks to do at all times is to edify, to imitate Jesus Christ in his limitless charity, in his readiness to give way in everything personal, in anything which is not offensive to God.
We have to make a special effort to learn the lesson which Christ is teaching us today. We have to forgive always, in small things and in great, without bitterness or resentment, knowing that this is how He will forgive our offences, just as we pray many times a day in the Our Father. At home and in the street, at work and at rest, in family life and in professional life, in sickness and in health, this has to be our spirit. A person who harbours grudges, our Father wrote, canât achieve anything in life. Every day we have to be able to say, non verbo neque lingua, sed opere et veritate, not in word or speech but in deed and in truth: dimitte nobis debita nostra, sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris (forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us). But forgiveness doesnât mean turning a blind eye to situations which are manifestly unjust, above all when this form of tolerance could itself become an abuse by condoning something which could be a danger for other children of God.
Our Fatherâs example in forgiving: forgive promptly, without failing to defend the truth.
As well as with his words, our Founder also taught us by his example to be generous in forgiving. At Mass I remember to pray not only for my children, for my parents, and for my childrenâs parents, but also for those people still living who wish us harm, as well as those who slandered us in the past and who have since gone to render their account to God. I say: âLord, I forgive them so that You too will forgive them, and will forgive us our sins. I offer the same prayers to You for the repose of their souls, as I offer for my children, and for my parents, and for my childrenâs parents. The very same!â
Our Lord is very pleased with this, and it makes me very happy too. I recommend you to do the same: donât ever wish anybody evil. Holding grudges against people only leads to unhappiness. And why on earth should we choose to be unhappy if we are children of God? We have to learn to forgive.
Afterwards, if someone tells you that that is heroic, you can laugh. Itâs something wonderful. Doesnât our Lord forgive us when we offend him? So why shouldnât we forgive too? And afterwards, if it is appropriate, you can still call things by their names: a lie is a lie, and libel is still libel, and defamation is still defamation, and envy is still envy. But always forgive, from the very start. If you do you will be happy.
To forgive doesnât mean abstaining from stating the truth, because we also have a tongue, and we have to write and to speak out whenever Godâs honour, the reputation of his Church or the good of souls requires it. But even then, as our Founder reminded us many years ago, one has to write in a positive fashion, affirming things. Be moderate in defence, objective in stating the facts, and avoid all rhetorical argument. Be clear and firm in doctrine, and very understanding -supernaturally understanding - towards individuals.
Years later our Father repeated the same ideas once more: My daughters and sons, gaudete in Domino semper! Rejoice always in the Lord! What must we do in order to be at peace? Let me share my own experience with you. Firstly, learn to forgive. Always forgive, because what takes away our peace are the little things of pride⌠And afterwards, accept Godâs Will See the Lord behind everything that happens.
To forgive is something completely supernatural; it is a divine gift. That sort of mercy is not natural to man. We forgive to the extent to which we share in Godâs life, to which we try to correspond as far as we can.
And so, my dear children, fight hard, and be happy! Servite Domino in laetitia! Serve the Lord with gladness! Infect others with this same madness, pray for the whole world, keep sowing the peace and joy of mutual love, because we donât wish evil on anybody. You know that it is part of the spirit of the Work to be prompt to forgive.
Our Lady will obtain for us the grace we need to love everybody with such affection that we are able to overlook their offences; and we will make use of those opportunities to ask her Son to forgive us our own sins.