But to you who hear I say, love your enemies
do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.
But to you who hear I say, love your enemies
o good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.
Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time
February 24, 2019
Luke 6:27-38
“Love your enemies.” It is a good slogan. It looks nice framed on the wall. Luke’s Gospel however is not a catalogue of slogans, it is a way of life. This faith we share is not a list of beliefs about God plus behavior. We are Christians not because of what we believe, but because we have been called to be disciples of Jesus. To become a disciple is to become part of a different community with a different set of practices. So, this Gospel next week is just as tough as the one we proclaimed this week. There are no loopholes to avoid this challenge. There is no way to make this teaching a “theory” or an “ideal.” There is no way to lift this challenge out of reality and turn it into an abstract void that would allow us to reason: “Well, I’ll love my enemies but I won’t like them!” That reasoning is evasive. It is a faceless alibi – an excuse for avoiding what is asked of us. To keep us from running in that direction, Jesus closes the door on that thinking with the details of his plan for enemy love. “Do good to those who hate you.” “Bless them.” “Pray for them.” Yet something in us reasons that Jesus failed to see what was to come. Evil regimes and terrorist attacks that we have come to know could never have been in his mind. We think he never could have imagined the horrors and evils we have seen. But to think that way is to reveal that we have never stood under the cross and never heard Jesus Christ speak through blood-stained lips: ”Father, forgive them.” We need to go there to get it right. We need to hear those words from that place. Then, the opening words of next week’s Gospel will make sense to us: “To you who hear I say, Love……”
Fr. Tom Boyer