23rd Sunday of Year A, September 10, 2023

 

Forgiveness, in God’s vision, is not limited to erasing the past, but generates a different life in the future, renewed by that love which is the fullness of the Law.”

We pray therefore in this holy Mass, that we learn to always look out for our straying brothers and sisters, be willing to forgive those who trespassed against us, and that we ourselves may also receive forgiveness for our failings. Happy Sunday!

DOCTRINE AND FAITH

(Ezekiel 33,1.7-9; Psalm 94 (95); Romans 13,8-10; Matt 18,15-20; 23rd Sunday of Year A, September 10, 2023)

“Do not owe anyone anything except mutual love” (Rom 13,8). Paul uses here the same verb with which Jesus taught us to pray in the Our Father, when he urges us to forgive our neighbours the debts, they owe us so that God will forgive us our own debts (cf. Matt 6,12). Combining the two texts, we sense how the only debt we owe to others, that of mutual love, is expressed in a culminating way precisely in the willingness to forgo debts, that is, to forgive. It is not for nothing that Jesus places at the foundation of the Christian community pardon which must be given not only seven times (as Peter would have it) but “seventy times seven” (Matt 18,22). We will listen to these words of Jesus next Sunday, when the liturgy proclaims the conclusion of chapter 18 of Matthew.

To this same chapter belongs today's passage, centered on the theme of fraternal correction, which immediately precedes the reflection on forgiveness. It seems to Jesus that community life is built on the basis of this wise relationship between correction and forgiveness. The verses we are hearing today, in fact, are placed at the heart of the community discourse of this eighteenth chapter. Immediately before, Jesus had reminded his disciples that at the center of the community there were the little ones and, among them, sinners, who must be looked for just like the shepherd in the parable does, willing to leave ninety-nine sheep on the mountains, to look for the one sheep lost (cf. Matt 18,12-14). A concrete way of doing this is constituted precisely by fraternal correction, through which the whole community seeks out the lost person in order to regain him or her in the communion of the flock. On the other hand, the text on correction introduces the verses that follow, which focus on the theme of forgiveness, which must always be given, on every occasion. Forgiveness, in God’s vision, is not limited to erasing the past, but generates a different life in the future, renewed by that love which is the fullness of the Law. It is also done through a wise and fraternal correction, eager to give those who have made a mistake not only forgiveness, but a new life. It is therefore necessary that forgiveness and correction are lived in the right relationship with each other. We are often tempted to put correction before forgiveness, and we say, “I am willing to forgive you if you accept my correction and change your ways.” Instead, Jesus invites us to reverse the perspective. Forgiveness is always to be given, on every occasion, but it must then generate a word that makes it fruitful in the life of those who make mistakes. Correction allows forgiveness, already granted, to become a source of new life in the existence of those who accept it. We know well how the processes of conversion and rebirth are slow and gradual. Likewise, both forgiveness and correction require the patience of time. Successive stages are needed, in which a growth of the word takes place. At first, it is a personal word; then it becomes the word of two or three witnesses; finally, it becomes the word of the community.  In this way, it is as if the word were purified, sifted, subjected to a progressive discernment. Moreover, the culminating word is that of prayer. If the other words have remained sterile and unproductive due to the hardness of heart of those who have not wanted to listen to them, there is one word that remains effective and that is the word of supplication.

God the Father, unlike men, is the one who always listens; provided that what we address to him is an unanimous word, pronounced by a community gathered in the name of Jesus. It is significant that what leads to the word of agreement (therefore to the agreement of the community) is precisely the sin, even the obstinate one, of the brother. Sin always has a disruptive violence, such as to break communion and compromise relationships. For Matthew, on the contrary, the community is evangelical when it is capable of agreeing, and therefore of building itself in a unanimous way in praying for the brother who is wrong. The main concern for the community must be that of “winning one's brother” (Matt 18,15); but we could say (broadening the horizon) that it is the fraternity itself that must be earned. It is not a reality that has already been given, acquired once and for all, but must be earned again, going through those lacerations that compromise it and obscure its face. What really builds fraternity is not so much the ability to avoid conflicts, whether small or large but the willingness to regain peaceful relationships within the tensions that inevitably arise. Abba John Kolobos said: “It is not possible to build a house from the top down, but from the foundations up”. He was asked, “What does this word mean?” He then elaborated, “The foundation is your neighbour, which you must earn. This is the first duty on which all the commandments of Christ depend”. It is not a question of carrying out an ideal project of fraternity; instead, we need to start from the foundations, gaining the brother, that is, responding to the concrete brother who challenges me and often disturbs me with his request, his need, his own sin. 

+ John I. Okoye.

{graphics  by Chukwubike OC}