Seventh
Sunday of Ordinary Time (C) [Lk 6:27-38]
Love
of Enemies
23.02.2025
1. Theme in brief
Overcoming evil with good
2.
Focus Statement
As we are the children
of our heavenly Father, just like him we too are called to overcome evil with
good by showing mercy even towards our enemies, that is, those who hate, curse,
abuse, strike us and take away our goods.
3. Explanation of
the text
According
to Jesus, real love is so boundless and universal that it excludes no one, not
even our enemies. In today’s gospel, Jesus uses the term “enemy” not in
the strict sense to mean someone who has done immense harm or injustice to us
as we commonly understand, but in a broader sense or with an extended meaning
to include anyone who opposes, dislikes or mistreats us and those whom we do
not love as we should or those whom we love less. According to this text, our
enemies are all those who hate us, curse us, abuse us, strike us on our cheek and take away what belongs to us (6:27-29).
What does loving our enemies mean? In the given
text Jesus says that we should love them by doing good to them, blessing them, praying for them, offering the other cheek to
them and sharing our goods even with those who try to grab them (6:27-30). Showing the other cheek to
those who slap us on one cheek (6:29) does not mean that we should allow or
invite our enemies to attack us. That goes against the principle of our right
to protect our life. Actually, when we show the other cheek, the opponent can
slap us only with the back side of his right palm or with the left hand. Both
of these things mean an insult. Hence, what Jesus seems to say is that we should
refrain from any revenge, that is, returning an insult for an insult or a slap
for a slap from our enemies; instead win over them by doing good to them. Then
he lays down the golden rule for his followers: treating or
behaving with others, including their enemies, just as they would want them to
treat or behave with them (6:31).
The given gospel text also answers the question why
we should love our enemies. Jesus answers this question by saying that there is
no credit or merit for his disciples in loving only those who love them, in doing good to those who do good to
them, and sharing one’s goods only with those who share equal quantity of goods (6:32-34). There is no greatness or speciality in
this type of behaviour because sinners also do the same without hearing any gospel (6:32-34).
This type of attitude or behaviour should flow from the call of disciples to be
God’s children. Since they are God’s children, their behaviour
towards their enemies should reflect God’s own treatment of them (6:35). As heavenly
Father is merciful towards even to the ungrateful and the wicked (6:35), his children are called to
imitate the same merciful love without expecting anything in return (6:35-36).
4.
Application to life
To know who are our ‘enemies’ we do not necessarily
have to think of our national or religious enemies living at a distance from us,
or those who have grabbed our land and property. According to today’s gospel,
they can be found within our homes, neighbourhood and field of activities. They
include those who hate, curse and abuse us, those who strike us, take away our goods. Loving such people means doing good to them, blessing them, praying for them, offering the other cheek to them when they strike us and sharing our goods even with those who try to
grab them. In
other words, Jesus asks us to do good to those who criticize us, those who are aggressive to us by their way of
thinking, talking, behaving and treatment; and those who spread rumours and
vicious slander against us. Praying for
this type of people is a sign of our love and forgiveness. Can we pray for our
enemies if we are nursing vengeance and hatred towards
them? If we earnestly pray for them, it indicates that we have forgiven them at
heart. Our prayer for our enemies may or may not convert them. However, it will
bring about a change of attitude in ourselves and eliminate our thirst for their
blood.
Thus Jesus asks us to imitate God’s own merciful love and generous
forgiveness towards the wicked by responding to hatred, curse, abuse and insult
with the same merciful love, and by refraining from all sorts of revenge and retaliation towards such people. Offering
the other cheek does not mean allowing our enemies to attack us. It means not to
return a slap for a slap, an insult for an insult or a hurt for a hurt, but
doing good to those who do such evil. Since our heavenly Father is merciful towards
the wicked, sinners and the ungrateful, as his children, we too have to are
called to imitate his mercy. If we do not exhibit anything of the Father’s nature, how can we claim to be
his children?
In today’s gospel, Jesus not only means that we should
avoid any sort of revenge and retaliation, such as returning a slap for a slap
against those who hate, curse and abuse us, but much beyond that. He wants that we
should actively and positively do good to them. In other words, he urges us to
make our love pro-active and not re-active. Re-active love means we return love for love, help for help, kindness
for kindness, and do it only for those who are good to us, love us, help us and
are kind to us. Jesus wants his followers to take their love beyond ‘re-active’
boundaries Pro-active love involves doing good to people who do not do any good
to us, harm us, threaten us and are after our blood, or from whom we do not
expect any good in return. Thus, loving our enemies does not necessarily mean
becoming affectionate or friendly with them, but doing good to them and refraining from retaliation or
revenge.
Jesus’ instruction on non-resistance of the wicked should be
understood to mean avoidance of violent resistance towards them that breeds further
violence. That does not include the passive resistance or non-violent or non-cooperative
resistance which we sometimes need to offer to unjust oppressors and perpetrators of injustice or violators of human
rights as exemplified by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King (Jr.). When we
are wronged by those who hate and strike us, our first reaction is to teach
them a lesson. Jesus tells us not to return violence for violence. Instead of
planning revenge and retaliation in our minds, he wants that we plan how to do
good and pray for such people.
Forgiveness is not a feeling, but a decision of the mind or an act of the will. It is not like
“falling in” love as we speak of some sweethearts, but a choice we make with a conscious effort. It is choosing
to love rather than choosing to keep hatred and revenge in mind. When we are deeply
hurt, in prayer we need to act out forgiveness first in our minds by a kind of self-talk: “Come what may; I
shall forgive so and so from my heart”. Don’t
we find it easy to love the whole world but forgive the persons with whom we
live and work everyday? It requires a struggle and a decision of the mind to do
so. Normally, we place conditions like ‘if’ and ‘but’ before we
forgive those who have hurt us deeply. We are afraid of the risk of getting
hurt again by the same persons. These considerations hold back our forgiveness
and prompt us to nurse resentment and revenge. Jesus invites us to
cultivate mercy towards those who have hurt us by trying to understand the
issue from that person’s point of view. Do we?
Forgiveness liberates us from bitterness and hatred, and brings peace
of mind. By unforgiving attitude, we condemn ourselves to carry a heavy burden,
sometimes for years and years; sometimes for the rest of our life. it frees the one who offers and
the one who receives pardon from this bondage. Those who are bitter
and cannot forgive are sick: they need love, attention and care and have to be
free for our own good.
In Jesus’ time people prayed against their enemies so
that God may punish them. Against such a mentality, he asks his disciples to pray for the reform of enemies. Even if our
prayer may not necessarily reform or change our enemies, it will change our plan of retaliation against
them. The best way to overcome bitterness against those who have offended us is
to constantly pray for them. We cannot pray for our offenders while keeping
hatred and revenge in our hearts. By our constant prayer, they get converted in our hearts first –
though we do not know whether they will be really converted! We should leave it
to God. This is another way of overcoming evil with good and hatred with love, as
taught by Jesus.
Jesus gives the reason for this type of behaviour. He
says that this type of attitude or behaviour should flow from our call to be God’s own
children. Forgiveness is an act of compassion towards our offenders. We are called to keep
our own dignity as God’s children and
imitate the nature of the Father who is compassionate towards all his enemies. He says
that there is no credit or greatness and speciality in re-active love because sinners or non-believers
also know how to return good for good by nature. As God’s children it is our
vocation to imitate his merciful love by doing deeds of mercy to our opponents
and wrongdoers without expecting
anything in return.
The world thinks that forgiveness offered to our
bitterest enemies is a sign of weakness. But in reality it is a sign of strength. A few years ago, in
5.
Response to God's Word
Do we love
those who hate us, curse
us, abuse us, strike us on our cheek and take away what belongs to us by doing good to them, blessing
them, praying for them, and by refraining from taking revenge against them? Do
we exhibit the compassionate nature of God by showing mercy towards such
people? What decisive stepss do we take to do good to those who do evil? Do we
try to overcome evil by doing good, or continue to remain in our soul-sickness
caused by nursing grudges and revenge against our offenders?
6.
A prayer
Lord, make me an instrument of your love so that I can do good to all
those who hate me, curse
me, abuse me, strike me and take away what belongs to me. Today I pray for them
and bless all of them in your holy name. Amen.
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