Forgiveness

HOMILY LENT WEEK 03 02 – Year II

Forgiveness and the Furnace of Resentment:

(Dan 3:25-43; Ps 25; Mt 18:21-35)

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A lady confessed the sin of narcissism, of vanity to a priest. She claimed she was so beautiful that she was wasting countless hours admiring herself in the mirror, putting on make-up, neglecting her marriage and her family, so she must be guilty of the sin of narcissism. The priest told her to wait a minute, hopped out of the confessional, opened the door to the penitent’s side, looked at her, then stepped back into his side and told her, “Lady, in your case, it’s not a sin – it’s just a mistake!

Forgiving others from the heart is the way to peace and joy.

In the gospel, Jesus has just finished teaching the apostles how to forgive from the heart: instead of reacting in kind (fighting, fleeing or freezing), we are to go to them alone, remind them of what they have done, share how we feel about their hurtful behaviour, tell them we are trying to forgive them, and then let it go and move on.

Peter, of course, asks how many times we should do this. Jesus’ use of perfect numbers (3, 4, 10, 70 adding up to 77), symbolizing infinity, teaches Peter (and us) that if we are to be his disciples and follow him, we can’t just forgive once in a while – we must become forgiveness, just like God, who never stops forgiving. It must become part of our DNA and ooze out of us.

The parable Jesus recounts to make his point has a Master moved with pity and cancelling the entire debt of a servant that would amount to nine million dollars! – extreme exaggeration to communicate the breath of God’s mercy towards us. The fact that the selfish debtor is owed a mere fifteen dollars illustrates how hesitant we are, by contrast, in showing mercy to one another.

The debtor throttles a fellow servant, ignores his attempts and promises, and throws him into prison. And in his attempt to imprison the other, he ends up being “tortured” and imprisoned himself. And that is the ironic point of this teaching – if we do not forgive others, we can’t receive forgiveness ourselves. In the light of the first reading, one could say that we place ourselves into a fiery furnace of resentment. Refusing to forgive and holding onto resentments is like drinking poison ourselves, all the while thinking it will hurt the other person. Or it is like burning the bridge upon which we ourselves must walk.

The first reading today from the Book of Daniel is from the prayer of one of the three young men in the fiery furnace. His name Azariah (“God helps), surely represents the desperate but fervent prayer that would characterize anyone “walking around in the flames of a fiery furnace.” He appears to God to keep his part of the covenant relationship, with all of the proper humility, confession of sin and pleading for mercy that might be expected. He asks YHWH to operate from God’s better instincts and assures YHWH that they will do the same and “follow you with our whole heart” from now on. It is a good prayer that tells us what we can expect from this God of Israel.

In the light of the gospel, that fiery furnace can become the resentment and bitterness that lodges in the heart of those who are unable to, or refuse to forgive. It can also represent the difficult and hurtful situations that face some of us every day from people around us, even those we love. Our challenge is to forgive them from the heart, something we can only do with the help of the indwelling Spirit of Jesus who is forgiveness. Therefore, our need to pray that prayer of Azariah, from the heart.

What can help is that whenever we do forgive from the heart, we are just like Jesus on the Cross (Father, forgive them, they know not what they do) and when we act like God, we get to feel like God – peace and joy beyond all price.

One person during a mission shared how hurtful her husband is – dominant, belligerent, pretending to know everything, refusing to admit any wrong-doing yet constantly putting her down, criticizing her and very much in denial about his anger and his addiction to alcohol. Because of her commitment, and for the sake of the children, she is trying to make the marriage work. She finds herself sinking deep roots of faith, participating in the Eucharist as often as she can, and praying that she can continually deal with the daily hurt through forgiveness. She is very much an Azariah in a fiery furnace.

The Eucharist is both a source of forgiveness and healing for us, and also a source of strength to enable us to live the teachings of Jesus to forgive 77 times.

May our celebration deepen our faith in God’s steadfast love for us, bring us forgiveness and healing, and empower us to forgive from the heart, those who have hurt us.