(The following is from Thaddeus, who is a deacon at St. Joseph's University Parish, Buffalo, NY. He has been in ministry and has taught high school and college. His homily speaks to the hard truth of healing our country, and the world, from the terror, death and horror of Sept. 11, 2001.
It's been 10 years and while the world is more aware of the pain of terrorism and hate, we are still globally grappling with healing from that terrible day and learning how to love and walk in forgiveness without condoning the evils. Thaddeus says it best in the following homily he presented this morning to his parish when he calls us into forgiveness, as the first step toward healing.
Through forgiveness, we step out of the cycle of hate and make a determined choice to be who we are - people of unconditional love, living in light and hope. If we fail to forgive, then the terrorists will have taken even more than the 3,000 lives they snuffed out that day, they will have taken our souls and filled us with a dark and hideous bitterness seasoned by and with their own hate.
If we fail to forgive, they win. If we can forgive, perhaps only with God's grace and help, we will have been enobled by this terrible and great tragedy. It may be the hardest thing we can do - forgive, but it may also be the most important. Thank you Thaddeus - dear precious servant of God, for sharing your light, wisdom and love with your beautiful and caring parish and our world through Tiger Lilies.)
September 11, 2011
It seems an uncanny coincidence that today’s gospel parable (Matthew 18:21-35*) about radical forgiveness, predetermined by the 3 year cycle of the lectionary, should be heard in churches around the world as we observe the tenth anniversary of the tragedy of September 11, 2001. When such powerful coincidences occur, spiritual teachers call it “Sacred Synchronicity” highlighting a powerful message from God in the event.
While the obvious message in today’s readings is about forgiveness, forgiving 70 times 7, there is also a challenging observation about human nature. That is found in the last words of the gospel that call us to forgive “from your heart”. In our day and age, this infers feelings and emotions, but to the original audience, the heart is the core of intelligence and free will.
Every person controls their own thoughts and ideas. We are the Masters of our Minds! Where do these thoughts and ideas come from? First of all, each person has their own long history of experiences that shape and influence what we think. Also, in our ever expanding world of social diversity, we constantly receive messages from a variety of sources in print, the media and social interaction. For the past few weeks we have all heard numerous stories about the losses, the grief, the heroes and the families of 9/11.
The question to each of us involves how we personally react when negative situations cause us pain and grief and remind us, all too vividly, that we do not live in a perfect world. That is why psychologists tell us that we need forgiveness, why Jesus talks so much about forgiveness and why we are told to pray daily, “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us”. Powerful encouragement, but yet, We are the Masters of our Minds!
One of the most difficult things for humans to do is to forgive. When I taught lessons about forgiveness during my 38 years as an educator, the students almost always objected with statements like:
“How could you ever forgive someone who kills someone you love or cheats on you?”
“I think it’s wrong to forgive people, they deserve to be punished for what they did!”
“I admire people who can forgive others, but I know I could never do it!”
What does this complex and often misunderstood spiritual act really mean? Authentic forgiveness does not promote willful ignorance or a Pollyanna type of wishing evil would simply go away. In point of fact, real forgiveness assumes a candid and realistic knowledge of wrongs committed and is accordingly accompanied by legitimate anger. Moses was angry, King David was angry, and Jesus was angry when confronting the hardness of heart of the Pharisees and when cleansing the Temple.
Ephesians 4 says, “You do well to be angry, but don’t use your anger as fuel for revenge. Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry.” Were we and can we still be legitimately angry about the tragedy of September 11th? Absolutely! Thomas Aquinas said that anger is the natural response to injustice, for it is the passion to make things right.
Martin Luther King was angry at racial inequality in mid-twentieth century America.
Gandhi was angry at the injustices born of British imperialism.
Pope John Paul II was angry at the oppressive policies of communism.
They were all justified in their anger. This is why the Bible speaks of God’s anger. It doesn’t mean that God passes into an emotional snit; it means that God tries to straighten out a world that is led astray by misguided people. We are the Masters of our Minds!
Perhaps Alexander Pope described this tension most adequately when he wrote, “To err is human, to forgive divine.” What, then, is forgiveness?
Forgiveness is not condoning; we are never obliged to approve of offensive behavior that is harmful and destructive;
Forgiveness is not forgetting; some wounds are too deep to ever forget;
Forgiveness is not the same as reconciliation; we may with great effort manage to forgive another but still not desire to be in their presence;
Forgiveness is not denial; we must look directly into the offense and let the horror and shame sink deep within us. For healing must be as deep as the wound.
Forgiveness is a great act of unconditional love. As Christ hung upon the cross, he cried out from the depths of his wounded body, “Father, forgive them, they do not know what they are doing!”
Those words became a central theme for the New Testament writers who saw that the first generation Churches faced persecution from the outside as well as division internally. The survival of that early Church depended upon tolerance and forgiveness. 2000 years later we are challenged in a similar way to embrace this way of thinking to build a new world and to look optimistically to the future.
Ten years ago our hearts were broken by terrorism. But we can deny them victory by refusing to submit to a world created in their image. Terrorism inflicts not only death and destruction but also emotional oppression to further its aims. We must not allow this act to drive us away from being the people that God has called us to be.
We are a community that values tolerance, compassion, justice and the sacredness of human life as the heart of our religious traditions. This has been a test of our national and religious character. May we today recommit ourselves to praying, to acting & to uniting against the bitter fruits of division, hatred and violence. We are a community that values thinking and intelligence.
We are the Masters of our Minds! Let us rededicate ourselves to global peace, human dignity and the eradication of injustice that breeds rage and vengeance.
As believers today gather in houses of worship around the world, let us continue the process of healing and pray for an increase in wisdom, so that we may continually develop to think as God thinks and to love as God loves.
*Matthew 18: 21-35
Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?”
22 Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.[a]
23 “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24 As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold[b] was brought to him. 25 Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
26 “At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’27 The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
28 “But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins.[c] He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.
29 “His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’
30 “But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31 When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened.
32 “Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33 Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ 34 In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.
35 “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”
One last note - this blog post is being posted at the same time that the first plane, Flight 11, crashed at roughly 466 mph into the north face of the North Tower (1 WTC) of the the World Trade Center, between floors 93 and 99.
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