Forgiveness brings freedom - freedom from being controlled by the past, freedom from the emotional ties to the offender, freedom from the continual inner conflicts of bitterness and hate, freedom to become whole and enjoy the fullness of
life.
- Jeanette Vought
(Where do you need to practice forgiveness at this time in your life?)
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1 Kgs 21:17-29; Psalm 51:3-4, 5-6ab, 11 and 16
Mt 5:43-48
Jesus said to his disciples:
“You have heard that it was said,
You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.
But I say to you, love your enemies
and pray for those who persecute you,
that you may be children of your heavenly Father,
for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good,
and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust.
For if you love those who love you, what recompense will you have?
Do not the tax collectors do the same?
And if you greet your brothers only,
what is unusual about that?
Do not the pagans do the same?
So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
Reflection on the Scriptures
Jesus challenges us to love one another, including our enemies, as he has loved us. And we know that Jesus loved us to his death. Jesus also commands us to pray for those who persecute you. Can I pray for all those individuals responsible for the over 200 mass shootings in the United States this year? Can I see them as God sees them: as being
worthy of God’s mercy and love? I know I need God’s grace to love an enemy responsible for so much violence, death, and tragedy. Perhaps any person who challenges me, who shows me my limitations, who forces me to turn to God for help and grace, is not an enemy, but a friend.
I pray for all those who mourn the loss of loved ones through senseless violence. I also pray for the repentance of those who have perpetrated such acts of violence.
- by John Shea, S.J.
The Existence of God
by Francois Fenelon
SECTION XVII. Of the Sun
But how is it possible for the course of the sun to be so regular? It appears that star is only a globe of most subtle flame. Now, what is it that keeps that flame, so restless and so impetuous, within the exact bounds of a perfect globe? What hand leads that flame in so strait a way and never suffers it to slip one side or other?
That flame is held by nothing, and there is no body that can either guide it or keep it under; for it would soon consume whatever body it should be enclosed in. Whither is it going? Who has taught it incessantly and so regularly to turn in a space where it is free and unconstrained? Does it not circulate about us on purpose to serve us? Now if this flame does not turn, and if on the contrary it is our earth that turns, I would fain know how it comes to be so well placed
in the centre of the universe, as it were the focus or the heart of all nature. I would fain know also how it comes to pass that a globe of so subtle matter never slips on any side in that immense space that surrounds it, and wherein it seems to stand with reason that all fluid bodies ought to yield to the impetuosity of that flame.
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