by Angela (Lambert) Jendro

7^th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Gospel of Luke 6:27-38 NAB

Jesus said to his disciples: “To you who hear I say, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. To the person who strikes you on one cheek, offer the other one as well, and from the person who takes your cloak, do not withhold even your tunic. Give to everyone who asks of you, and from the one who takes what is yours do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you. For if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do the same. If you lend money to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, and get back the same amount. But rather, love your enemies and do good to them, and lend expecting nothing back; then your reward will be great and you will be children of the Most High, for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

“Stop judging and you will not be judged. Stop condemning and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven. Give, and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap. For the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you.”

Meditation Reflection:

We most experience love, when we experience mercy. Love expresses itself the deepest in forgiveness, in patience with another’s faults or inadequacies, in tender care during times of physical or emotional weakness, in the desire for one to have even more than they deserve. God is Love (1John 4:8), and His incarnate Son revealed God by His mercy – through the humility to share our burdens, through His tender touch of healing, through His words of Truth, and through His suffering and death on the Cross for the forgiveness of our sins.

Jesus gave the New Commandment to “Love one another as I have loved you”(John 13:34) and exhorted us to “be merciful as your heavenly Father is merciful,” (Luke 6:36) instructing that we will be judged by how much we loved saying “whatever you did to the least of these you did it to Me” (Matthew 25:40). As Jesus’ disciples therefore, we too are called to reveal the Father’s love through lives of mercy.

Mercy doesn’t mean enabling sin or saying that abusive behavior is okay. Rather, mercy requires that we acknowledge sin as sin, otherwise we could not forgive. Mercy acknowledges human limitations and chooses to bend down and humbly meet the person where they’re at. Entitlement is not mercy but justice. Giving someone their due is simply what’s owed. That’s why Jesus doesn’t find it particularly extraordinary. It’s precisely within the context of justice however, that mercy can be freely given – and it’s the freedom of the giving that is the essence of love. Mercy means giving someone what isn’t their due. As Pope Francis asserted:

“[Justice and mercy] are not two contradictory realities, but two dimensions of a single reality that unfolds progressively until it culminates in the fullness of love.” Misericordiae Vultus April 11, 2015 [1]

Jesus teaches us how to love by teaching us how to show mercy. As the Mystical Body of Christ, He is the Head and we are the Body. Each person will have to face judgment, but the judge is Jesus Christ. Oftentimes, we want justice for others but mercy for ourselves. Jesus reminds us that we cannot be hypocrites. The measure we apply to others will be the measure we receive. We can’t have it both ways. Either we all receive mercy, or we all receive strict justice.

The more we have received mercy, the more we love to give it in return. Those who have come to terms with the reality of their own sin and had the courage to bring them before the Lord in Confession and receive His forgiveness and healing, then see others in the same light with eyes of tenderness and a thirst for their salvation too. Sin is suffering, even if it seems pleasurable or glamorous at the time. It always results in a degradation of the human person and the painful feelings that accompany that reality. Only the person who has not received mercy sits in judgment, wanting justice and not realizing that sin can be its own punishment. In Luke chapter 7, Jesus dined with a Pharisee. While there a sinful woman entered and washed his feet with her tears. Jesus explained to the astonished lawyer, that those who have been forgiven much love much.

There’s nothing timid about mercy. It doesn’t mean being a pushover or a relativist. Mercy requires the greatest strength of character, more than we even have on our own. Authentic mercy in its real application in your daily life toward the people in your life, takes grace. Only the love of Christ in our souls can fructify into the kind of patient, resilient, self-sacrificing, love that Jesus expects of His disciples.

Even Mother Teresa testified that she and her sisters could not do the kind of work they did every day without prayer and the graces that flowed from it. Serving the poorest of the poor in India was her calling, but she often taught that each of us is called to show the same kind of love in our families and neighborhoods.

“Let us make our homes real places of love so that we can overcome any hatreds. Love begins at home – everything depends on how we love one another at home. Do not be afraid to love until it hurts, because this is how Jesus loved.” Mother Teresa Thirsting for God: Daily Meditations ed. By Angelo D. Scolozzi, M.C. III.O.

A beautiful example of just such love, can be found in the life of Elisabeth Leseur (1866-1914). Her husband, who was the love of her life, was also an ardent atheist. Their circle of friends in the upper level of society in France shared his rationalist distaste for faith and Catholicism in particular. Nevertheless, her character and love drew their affections and even the desire for her guidance. In the end, her husband Felix had a conversion to faith and became a Catholic priest after her death. He credited her example, prayers, and suffering on his behalf for his change of heart. Her patience, calm, generosity, and love went so deep that in her greatest trials it proved supernatural to him. He writes of her during her final illness,

“When, having left her in the afternoon, I returned home in the evening, I was aware, as I approached her bed, of a calmness in her welcoming smile that would have been impossible in myself. For my own part, I knew well what kind of an invalid – intolerable to myself and to others – I would have been, instead of the source of serenity that she was to all around her; and I bowed down before the grandeur of the spirit that sustained and uplifted her.” The Secret Diary of Elisabeth Leseur

When I asked my students how they see Christian love in their home the answers they gave were revealing. One girl said she appreciated how her mother made a nice dinner every night, even though it was a long day at work. In addition, she noticed that her mom would often call her dad and ask him to pick something up on his way home and he always did. These little acts of kindness resonated with her. Other students commented on how much it meant to have a listening ear, help studying for a test, a ride to activities, and words of encouragement. All of these little daily things added up to lot for them.

I still remember today, several decades after the fact, an act of mercy on my own mother’s part. She had just had the (white) carpet cleaned. We ordered pizza for dinner and when the doorbell rang I answered it. Excitedly I ran up the stairs with the pizza, tripped, and the whole thing fell face flat on the newly cleaned white carpet. I stopped breathing. The natural reaction should have been to scream or be angry. Instead, my mother calmly stated, “accidents happen.” I knew this acceptance of my clumsiness was mercy. In consequence, when one of my children or students makes a similar bumble, I react with patience and mercy because when I was in their place that is what I received.

Jesus wants to shake us out of our pettiness and call us to magnanimity. Rather than bickering siblings, He exhorts us to mature into loving, giving, adults. There’s no need to point fingers, Jesus sees and He will judge. We only need to focus on the measure He will use to judge us by. The more generous we can be on earth the more generous He can be with us in Heaven. Moreover, the more we can be patient and kind in response to the daily annoyances we encounter, the more we can reveal the Father’s love. Our culture can be highly critical and competitive. Gentle love and merciful kindness is sorely needed and a true testament of the reality of grace.

Consider:

• When have you experienced mercy? Did you receive forgiveness? Tender loving care when you were ill? A hand up when you were down or starting out?
• How can you show mercy in your home through acts of love? Where could you add patience and understanding? What are your loved ones shortcomings and how could you be merciful in their weakness? How can you be of service – what are the daily needs in your home?
• Oftentimes judgment expresses itself as gossip, slander, and detraction. Consider how you could avoid participating in gossip or try to withhold critical comments about others. Think of someone you find most easy to criticize and think of an equal number of things you could compliment them about.

Make a Resolution (Practical Application):

• Thank God each day for the mercy He has shown to you. Think about the events of the day and be specific if you can.
• Do something kind, loving, or of service each day toward those in your everyday life. Look for opportunities to show patience.
• Read about the life of a saint and their example of practical mercy and love in the circumstances of their life.

~ Written by Angela Jendro © 2018

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[1] http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/apost_letters/documents/papa-francesco_bolla_20150411_misericordiae-vultus.html