March 09, 2020

We Know Not What We Do. God Knows All and Pours Out Overflowing Mercy.



Luke 6:36-38, the Gospel Reading at Mass on Monday of the Second Week of Lent

Jesus said to his disciples:
“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.”

When people do wrong, we never know fully and unfailingly what went on in their hearts, minds or lives before they did the wrong.

Only God can fully, unfailingly and always read everything in the soul of every person.

Yet he is merciful, and said in today’s Gospel:  Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.

From the cross on which men had nailed him, Christ told his Father to forgive them for they knew not what they were doing.

It is not possible to forgive a wrong without having judged it to be a wrong.

What we human persons are not able to judge— much less condemn— is the interior life of others.

The only all-knowing judge is God.

The utmost GIVER of all forgiveness is God.

The utmost GOAL of all forgiveness is God.

When Christ said from his cross, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do, Christ wanted them to be at one with the Father.

The deepest and highest goal of forgiveness is the sinner’s oneness with God.

The sinner’s greatest welfare is oneness with God.

The path of drawing nigh to God can be at times glad, but also at times a hard, sad way of the cross.

Even so, one way or another, at the end of all things being one with God will be the fullness of everlasting joy.

Until then, going to him opens us to some share in Christ’s way of the cross.

Being at one with God is the best and greatest we can wish for anyone, friend or foe.

God the forgiver chose to die so that sinners might rise to everlasting joy with him.

Here in his Eucharist, God— against whom each of us has sinned— offers us untold oneness with him at the cost of his own Body and Blood.

On his cross, his calling down forgiveness did not stop his suffering and death.

In the Body and Blood of Christ, God is— in the words of today’s Gospel— the good measure of forgiveness, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing.

Turn. Love. Repeat.