Sept. 11, 2014 Thursday: 23rd Week in Ordinary Time A
Love Your Enemies
For most of us, today is not just September 11, 2014, but the memorial of 911 — a day of horror that we can never forget, a date when our lives changed forever.
So today of all days, this Gospel is just so hard. “Love your enemies. . . Do to others as you would have them do to you.”
“WHAT! Really, God? In a world filled with evil doers, you expect us to ignore our instinct, to not exact revenge? I want to seek “vengeance;” yet you call us to practice “mercy?” In a society that exacts punishment, you expect us to “do good?” To love even those who hate us and killed our families and friends?
“Why?”
“Because I am Mercy. You have not received what you deserve for your sins. So mirror the mercy you have received: return good for evil, grace for ungratefulness, love for hate.”
—Howard Craig, www.jesuitprayer.org
For most of us, today is not just September 11, 2014, but the memorial of 911 — a day of horror that we can never forget, a date when our lives changed forever.
So today of all days, this Gospel is just so hard. “Love your enemies. . . Do to others as you would have them do to you.”
“WHAT! Really, God? In a world filled with evil doers, you expect us to ignore our instinct, to not exact revenge? I want to seek “vengeance;” yet you call us to practice “mercy?” In a society that exacts punishment, you expect us to “do good?” To love even those who hate us and killed our families and friends?
“Why?”
“Because I am Mercy. You have not received what you deserve for your sins. So mirror the mercy you have received: return good for evil, grace for ungratefulness, love for hate.”
—Howard Craig, www.jesuitprayer.org
