Loving enemies????? Today's Lent reflection.

FIRST READING  (Deuteronomy 26:16-19)
Moses spoke to the people, saying: "This day the Lord your God commands you to do these statutes and ordinances; you shall therefore be careful to do them with all your heart and with all your soul. You have declared this day concerning the Lord that he is your God, and that you will walk in his ways, and keep his statutes and his commandments and his ordinances, and will obey his voice; and the Lord has declared this day concerning you that you are a people for his own possession, as he has promised you, and that you are to keep all his commandments, that he will set you high above all nations that he has made, in praise and in fame and in honour, and that you shall be a people holy to the Lord your God, as he has spoken."


GOSPEL  (Matthew 5:43-48)
"You have heard that it was said, `You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

"For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?

"And if you salute only your brethren, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?

"You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect."


A GOOD STORY
The Sunday sermon was on "Forgive Your Enemies." The priest asked, "How many of you have forgiven your enemies?" About half the congregation held up their hands. He asked again, and about 80% put up their hands. The third time round, all hands were raised except for one elderly lady.

"Mrs Jones, I'm surprised at you. Why aren't you willing to forgive your enemies?"

"I don't have any" she responded.

"Are you sure, Mrs Jones? Said the priest. I find that very hard to believe! Please come to the front and explain to everyone how it is possible not to have an enemy in the world."

The little old lady tottered down the aisle, and said: "It's easy, Father. I'm ninety-three years old. I've outlived every single one of them!"


REFLECTIONS
Hearts on fire with the Love of God 
(Word of Life Community)

A godly homily for today
(Paul Hinnebusch)


FURTHERMORE . . .
I remember when I was a little girl in Russia during Holy Week every member of my family - father, mother, and all the servants lined up and, beginning with father, bowed low before one another and said to each, "Forgive me for any hurt that I might have inflicted on you." And the answer from the other was, "May the Lord forgive you as I forgive you. Amen." So everyone asked forgiveness from one another, because without forgiveness, which is the greatest sign of love, how can one receive the God of love?

We hurt people, unwillingly and even unwittingly, by the weakness of our nature, so we need forgiveness from our brothers and sisters, and we need to forgive them as well. We cannot enter Holy Week unless we forgive totally, uncompromisingly, and completely. For before our eyes will soon be Jesus Christ himself, who will cry out from the height of the cross, "Father, forgive them."

Since we are baptized into the death and life of Jesus Christ, we should not allow the night to fall on our anger. We should beg forgiveness and forgive every day. Let us pray that we may forgive, because no one forgives these days, nationally and internationally speaking, and perhaps also personally. That is why we have the mess that we have.
Catherine Doherty in the Madonna House Staff Letter #59 
(Reproduced in Grace in Every Season, page 97)


PRAYER
Lord, thou hast prepared a table for me
against them that trouble me.
Let that holy Sacrament of the Eucharist
be to me a defence and shield,
a nourishment and medicine, life and health,
a means of sanctification and spiritual growth;
that I, receiving the Body of my dearest Lord,
may be one with his mystical body,
and of the same Spirit,
united with indissoluble bonds of a strong faith,
and a holy hope,
and a never-failing charity,
that from this veil I may pass into the visions of eternal charity,
from eating thy Body to beholding thy face
in the glories of thy everlasting kingdom,
O blessed and eternal Jesus. Amen.
Bishop Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667)

Why am I seeking Jesus? (Fr Paul Hinnebusch)

Father Paul Hinnebusch, O.P. STM (1917-2002), a was Dominican preacher and prolific author, Bible scholar, and well-loved spiritual director. He was a teacher in the charismatic renewal, and his best selling book, Praise - A Way of Life, has influenced the spiritual growth of many people, at the sae time bridging the gap between liturgical and spontaneous expressions of prayer. Go HERE to the website packed full of his teachings, including homilies for Sunday and weekday Masses. The following is his homily on today's Gospel (John 6:22-29): 

“The crowd” . . . came to Capernaum looking for Jesus.” (John 6:24) But they were looking for him for the wrong reasons. Jesus said to them, “You are looking for me not because you saw signs, but because you ate the loaves and were filled.” (John 6:26) 

Each one of us needs to ask ourself, “Am I looking for Jesus?” 

“Yes”, you answer. But why am I looking for him? Take the people at Capernaum; am I looking for him as one who will serve my self-centered interests and purposes, one who will fill my belly with food? Or am I looking for him because I have understood the meaning of the signs he worked? 

These signs point to Jesus as the one “on whom the Father, God, has set His seal.” (John 6:27) That is, the miracles he worked have certified him as one authorized and empowered by God. Jesus was fully aware of his authority and power and mission. He declares his authority when he calls himself the one on whom the Father, God, has set his seal. And as we heard in the reading on Friday, as Jesus prepared to feed the five thousand with five loaves, St John, in telling the story says pointedly, “He himself knew what He was going to do.” (John 6:6) 

He is fully aware of exactly what he is authorized by God to do. The sign itself indicates what this is. He says to the crowd, “You are looking for me not because you saw signs, but because you ate the loaves and were filled.” You completely missed the meaning of the sign, the feeding of the five thousand. You are looking only for bodily food and the satisfaction of bodily, earthly needs. But I say, “Do not work for food that perishes, but for food that endures for eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For, on Him the Father, God, has set His seal.” (John 6:27) 

The feeding of the five thousand with five loaves, then, is the sign that Jesus is certified by God, authorized and empowered to nourish us for eternal life. In tomorrow’s reading, he will go on to say that he himself is “the bread of God which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.” (John 6:51) He is the living bread, the life-giving bread, which nourishes us for eternal life; and that eternal life is full communion in God’s own life. 

So I need to ask myself again, “Why am I looking for Jesus?” Am I turning to him as the Servant of my self-centered, earthly purposes? Or am I ardently looking for him as the one who alone can fulfill my deepest, truest need, my need for eternal life, for full communion with God in loving intimacy? 

Are all my daily efforts and labors only for perishable things? Or am I dead serious in cultivating the divine life in my heart? Am I seeking above all else a life of intimate communion with my Lord and God? 

“Do not work for food that perishes, but for the food that endures for eternal life which the Son of Man will give you.” (John 6:27)