Father Jim preaches about how loving your enemy will change the world in everyway.
A few weeks ago I was listening to NPR and they were interviewing a woman author of a book. She wrote a book on forgiveness. So various people were calling in and one woman caller said, “I know one woman who divorced her husband 30 years ago and she never developed any new friends. And every week she calls up her son, she calls up her daughter and she spews hatred on her ex-husband, she trashes her husband over and over again. Many times a week. What do you do?” And the author said, “We all suffer but we don’t all grow. Suffering can make you bitter or better. When hardships come,” she said, “we need to write a new story and move on.”
We need to write a new story and move on. We all have had people who have hurt us and some people here have been hurt very badly. But Jesus helps us to write a new story today and to move on in our lives. He begins by saying, “For those who are ready to hear the truth, listen.” For those who are ready to hear the truth because not everybody is ready to hear the truth. And that’s why Jesus spoke in parables all the time. Because if you are interested in hearing the truth you’ll get the point of the parable. And if your heart is hardened and your mind is closed you are never going to get the point. So that’s why He talked in parables. So that those who want to know the truth will get it.
And after he says, “If you want to know the truth…” He says these three revolutionary words… “love your enemies.”
On the first anniversary of 9-11, it landed on a Thursday and everybody came to mass, it was a packed church that night. We get the reading of today – the exact same reading…love your enemy, do good to those who hate you. And after mass a lady said to me, “For a whole year I’ve hated the terrorists who attacked us on 9-11. Today for the first time I was able to forgive them.” She was able to write a new story and go on with her life.
Notice Jesus uses the plural when He says this. Not love your enemy but love your enemies. You can’t pick and choose whom you are going to love or forgive. No limits. Enemies.
If we don’t quite get what He is saying, He says it four different ways. Listen to this. Number 1, love your enemies. Number 2, do good to those who hate you. Number 3, bless those who curse you. Number 4, pray for those who mistreat you.
Do good to those who hate you. Arch Bishop Tutu said, “The millions of dollars Americans spent bombing Afghanistan could have been spent building thousands of schools in Afghanistan, one of the poorest countries in the world. And in the process of building schools and hospitals we would have won over the heart of every Muslim in the world. We already had the sympathy of the world. Instead, what do we do? An eye-for-an-eye retaliation.” Do good to those who hate you. Imagine how powerful that would have been and how transforming in the world?
Bless those who curse you. A lot of you remember that story about our youth group who went to march in a gay pride parade in July. So all our kids are marching, holding these banners. A bystander yelled out, “You’re all going to hell!” And Laura, one of the kids said to her friends, “Yeah, like that’s new. I go to Spiritus!” But then she said to the heckler, “Sir! God bless you and have a good day.” And he hesitated in his reply, “Um, ah yeah….you too.” He didn’t know what to do. Here is a teenager teaching us that lesson from Jesus. Bless those who curse you.
Pray for those who mistreat you. A kid said to his mother, “Mom, we all hate our math teacher.” But the mother said, “Ah! You need to pray for her.” So a week later the mother says, “Have you been praying for your teacher?” And the kid says, “Yup! I’m praying she has a happy death before the end of the semester.”
Ok. Why do we laugh? Because we’ve done it and we know that that is not a prayer. And it is not a prayer to say, “God bless the S.O.B.” That’s not a prayer either.
Sometimes I hear people say, “I’m praying for President Trump.” And I say, “What are you praying for?” “That he sees the light. That he comes around.” Which is very much like saying that he comes to see things the way I do. And isn’t that what the Pharisee prayed in the temple in front of the tax collector?
So what does Jesus mean by “Pray for those who mistreat you”? He means pray for their happiness. Pray for their good fortune. Pray for their well-being. In other words pray for that person what you want for yourself. What do you want for yourself? Friends, good health, peace of mind, happiness. That’s what you pray for when you pray for your enemy.
It’s hard! You’ve done it. I’ve done it. It’s hard at the beginning to do that. But it gets easier and it purifies us and ennobles us.
Jesus goes on and gives us some examples of this revolutionary love of enemies. He says, “If somebody slaps you one cheek, offer the other and don’t retaliate.” Now, this is something that happened to Jesus. Remember? In his trial somebody slapped Him on His cheek. He didn’t fight and He didn’t slap him back.
He is not telling abused people to accept more abuse. Or to be a doormat. He is not telling women to accept more abuse from men. He is not telling people of color to accept more abuse from white people. A slap on the cheek is a put down, it’s an insult. It’s meant to demean somebody. And Jesus says, “Turn the cheek,” and refuse to be humiliated. Refuse to be put down. Because what is hurt is not me but my ego. You can’t possibly hurt me – the core of who I am.
You know if somebody spits at Niagara Falls it doesn’t diminish its grandeur. If somebody sneers at the Grand Canyon it doesn’t take away its beauty. We are more magnificent than Niagara Falls and the Grand Canyon.
So if somebody slaps you on the face, stand tall! Don’t take it. You’re not diminished. Look the aggressor in the eye. This stops things from escalating and it forces the aggressor to stop for a second and see what they are doing.
Next He says, “If a soldier takes your coat give him your undergarment as well.” Now, can you imaging giving a soldier your dirty underwear? You end up shaming the soldier instead of the soldier shaming you. And that’s the point. Don’t get shamed.
And this is a protest against the system that robs a person of their clothes when they go in to debt. Again, standing tall and refusing to be humiliated.
So love your enemies means acting in a nonviolent way. In a way that refuses to be a victim and simultaneously treats the aggressor with dignity.
We live in a culture filled with hate crimes. Immigrant bashing. White suppremist rallies. The reappearance of KKK and nooses. And homophobic attacks. But Jesus lived in very cruel times too. It wasn’t that different. And he knew that radical evil needed to be countered by not just sentimental love. Not by emotional love. Not by just mutual one-hand-washing-the-other kind of love. But radical love which means one way. One way love. That’s how God does it.
And that’s why when Jesus goes on to say, “When we do this radical love of our enemies, we resemble God. You will be rightly called the children of the Most High because God is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.” God is kind to everybody. God sends sun on the good and the bad. God sends rain on the just and the unjust. And isn’t that our goal? To be like God. And when we do this type of love we are just like God! It’s one way.
The holiest places on earth are the places where hatred has turned to love.
Jesus continues. “Stop judging.” Notice he doesn’t say, “Don’t judge.” Stop judging because you are already doing it. I do it all of the time. You do it all of the time. Stop judging. Stop looking down on people as less than yourself. Get on the other person’s turf and see things from their perspective. We have to become insiders to one another. We can’t understand somebody until we love them.
I know a woman who had a lot of trouble with her mother-in-law. Her mother-in-law was always putting her down. But the mother-in-law got cancer and the woman ended up taking care of her. Feeding her, bathing her. And the woman said this, “After I fed her and bathed her I started to understand who she was.” So it was in the loving that she understood.
A lot of times we think it is the other way around. Right? If you understand a person then you can love them. If you know their story then you can love them. That’s true but it goes the other way around too. Through her love she understood her.
Finally Jesus says, “The measure you use for others will be used back for you.” Remember that old story about that man who went up to heaven and Peter greets him and says tell me what have you done that’s good before you get in to heaven. The man says, “I gave $2 to a homeless man.” Peter says, “That’s fantastic! What else did you do?” “Well, I can’t think of anything else.” Peter says, “You can’t think of anything else? That’s it? $2 to a homeless guy?” Peter says, “I’d better check with God on this, check with the Boss.” So Peter goes in and tells God there is a guy out here who gave $2 to a homeless person. And God says, “That’s fantastic! What else did he do” Peter replied, “Well that’s the problem. He didn’t do anything else.” “Are you kidding me? He didn’t go anything else? I’ll tell you what. Give the gentleman his 2 bucks back and tell him to go to hell.”
Now, unfortunately a lot of us grew up on that kind of theology, which is not true. It is bad theology. That is you get paid in heaven what you gave out in this life. And that is not what Jesus is saying. A lot of us think that, we are going to get back in heaven what we did on this earth. No. You get back in this life what you give in this life. That’s what Jesus is talking about. You get back in this life what you give out. If you are generous with others it comes back to you. If you are loving towards others you have a whole life of love. We are all connected. If I give $100 to Haiti it’s like giving to myself. Because we are all one. If I jump in the subway bed to save your life, I’m saving my life too. We are all one. If I forgive you, I get forgiven immediately because we are one.
So outflow determines inflow. Whatever you give out comes back. Isn’t this exciting…that we are in charge of our own happiness. I think this is very exciting. Nobody can complain because it is up to us. We can be as loving, as forgiving and as kind as we want. And then outflow determines inflow. St. Francis knew that in his prayer. It is in giving that we receive. You don’t receive in heaven. You receive right now. It is in giving that we receive. It is in pardoning that we are pardoned.
Lastly, if we are presently not speaking to somebody. If we are holding a grudge. If we are hating a politician. If we are standing in judgment of somebody right now. Let Jesus’ words today become like it was for the lady that forgave the terrorists. Let His beautiful words become the grace that we need to write a new story and to move on and to build a peaceful world. Amen.
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