7th SUNDAY ORDINARY TIME FEB 19, 2023

Readings: Leviticus 19:1–2, 17–18, 1 Corinthians 3:16–23, Matthew 5:38–48

This Sunday we hear some of the most difficult teachings of our Lord, Jesus Christ. But first, let us reflect a bit about our faith. At the very basis of our faith is a belief in God. Today more and more people don’t believe in God at all. Even many people who would call themselves Catholics say that they do not believe in a God. That is difficult to imagine, perhaps, but it is documented in at least one opinion poll. Let us assume for a moment that all of us here believe in God.

We who believe in God also believe that God created the heavens and the earth and all that is in them. We have our own distinctive creation stories in our Bible, the Holy Scriptures. We believe that God has sent His Son, Jesus Christ, fully human and fully divine, to be our Savior. We believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and life everlasting. This short statement of what we believe, our Creed, is really important today. We want to continue to understand more profoundly what we believe. Only in the context of this belief do the teachings of Jesus make sense. We accept the teachings of Jesus first of all because He is God our Savior.

At the heart of the teachings of Jesus that we hear today are two teachings that are so important in our lives: forgiveness and acceptance of mistreatment. Jesus tells us “love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.” These teachings are so against our modern ways of thinking! Yes these same teachings would revolutionize our present world if we all lived them. The challenge is not to think to ourselves: “Nobody lives that way.” Rather, we can be thinking: “How can I live this way because Jesus has invited me to live this way.”

Let us pray today that our hearts might truly be open to forgiveness and to the acceptance of being treated badly. Let us love all of our enemies: the enemies of our country, the enemies of our families, our personal enemies, the enemies of our Church and whatever enemy there is! Let us learn to do good for all of these enemies. Let us bless them and pray for them.

Fr. Terry