Seventh Sunday Feb 18^th, 2007

1 Samuel 26, 2-23 Psalm: 1 1. Cur. 15: 45-49 Luke 6: 27-38

1. Our readings today open up a whole set of practical and theological questions that cannot even be listed let alone answered during this homily. We have David whose life has been endangered on at least four different occasions.

And so Saul was jealous and suspicious of David from that day on. 1 Sam. 18:9.

I will give my daughter to David. I will use her to trap him, and he will be killed by the Philistines. 1 Sam. 18:21

Saul was trying to pin David to the wall with his spear. But David dodged and ran away. 1 Sam. 19:9

David saw that Saul was out to kill him. 1 Sam. 23:15

We see David putting this into practice what Jesus tells us in the Gospel today. We see David sparing the life of the man who had tried to kill him on several occasions.

If not out of revenge, at least in self defense David should have tried to destroy Saul. It was not that he was not capable of murder as we see in later chapters of the Book of Samuel. And yet David will not kill Saul because Saul is God’s anointed one. Be generous and not kill your enemies.

2. Jesus repeats this “forgiveness of those who try to harm you” - and then takes it to a higher level.

love your enemies.

pray and do good to those who harm you.

This opens a whole can of worms. Now emotions take over rather than clear thinking. Jesus asks us not only to forgive, but to love and do good. So how do we deal with real evil.

On a more private and personal level

How do we deal with evil in the case of Incest?

How do we deal with evil in the case of sexual abuse among the clergy?

How do we deal with evil in the case of bullying in an apartment building that makes life a living hell for you and a danger to those who are dependant on you?

2b on a larger scale,

How does one forgive in Rwanda when Tutsis and Hutus killed over 800,000 people?

How does one forgive in former Yugoslavia where ethnic cleansing involved rape, torture and savage murder? Do we go in as we did after 9/11? The American authorities invaded Iraq with the intention of hunting and destroying the terrorists. Apparently it failed. If it succeeded, would that have been a Christian thing to do?

3. Our world today is, in one sense, far more complicated than that of the time of Jesus. Envy caused you to want to rob or harm the one with more money, talent, and skills. We see in the case of Saul and David. If there was physical injury, they abided with the law of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, to avoid total destruction of villages and tribes. Insults and destruction of one’s character was dealt with in the village court, with justice meted out immediately.

However, since the time of Jesus, there is something more evil, more sinister , more devious and more destroying than there was 2000 years ago. There is no remorse when harm is done. We see that in the case of Tonya Harding who injured Nancy Kerrigan. In her apology, Harding said “I want to apologies for being in the wrong place at the wrong time around the wrong people.” She did not apologies; she simply gave an excuse for having bad luck! People will just not admit they have done wrong, committed a sin, or done damage or destruction. Even in crime, there were certain acts that were absolutely taboo: hurting children and the elderly. We have become more educated and these taboos are disregarded. Children and the Elderly, who are the most vulnerable, are now the main targets.

4. So how do we live out the command of Jesus to love one’s enemies and do well to those who harm you? I wish I could give an easy answer, but I cannot. The only example I can give is the story of The Amish Christians.

On the 2nd October 2006, Carl Roberts entered an Amish school and gunned down 6 children and wounded six more.

Joan Chichester OSB said, “What really stunned the country about the attack on the small Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania was that the Amish community itself simply refused to hate what had hurt them. "Do not think evil of this man," the Amish grandfather told his children at one little girl's grave.

"Do not leave this area. Stay in your home here." The Amish delegation told the family of the murderer. "We forgive this man."

No, it was not the murders, not the violence that shocked us; it was the forgiveness that followed it for which we were not prepared. It was the lack of recrimination, the absence of vindictiveness that left us amazed. Baffled. Confounded. It was the Christianity we all profess but which they practiced that left us stunned. Never had we seen such a thing.

They live out today, what we preach from the pulpits and keep as an ideal. However we have a subconscious acknowledgment that for us ordinary people it is an impossible dream.

In the last century Friedrich Nietzsche and Sigmund Freud were philosophers of different styles, but they stated the same observation about Man. The awful news is that we are not as nice or decent as we claim to be. Under our civil behavior and an obsession for tidiness, there lay a boiling pot of anger and lust and a savage thirst for power. These wild impulses were repressed in a pressure pot that from time to time kept on exploding: We have Rwanda and Yugoslavia, we have the Hamas and the Fatah Movement, we have the Shias and Sunnis, we have the Catholics and Protestants.

We can easily admit to generic sins like: gossip and bad thoughts, to envy and adultery, to telling lies and a desire for revenge. What we refuse to admit is that in our arrogance and pride we can cold bloodedly destroy our fellow men, and even those in our own families. This we do all because of a hurt, an insult, or even a perceived dishonour. How low do we stoop.

5. It is here that Jesus steps in an encourages us to be like our Father whose forgiveness is total and complete. This forgiveness and love, like the rain falls on the good and evil in the same measure. This forgiveness is given to us sinners in whatever degree of sinfulness we find ourselves.

This same God not only forgives but loves us so much that he will give his only Son for our sakes. In the Old Testament, God is described as one being Aloof, all mighty, all powerful, removed from the nitty gritty of our everyday life. God seems to be apathetic. Then God takes a step which we human beings think is impossible. God loves us, and to love means to make oneself vulnerable to the person loved.

God becomes vulnerable. God takes on flesh when it was neither merited nor even expected. God’s love is shown

Not by merely forgiving our trespasses

Not by merely loving the enemy

Not even by doing good to those who sinned against God

But by putting the very Person of God at the whim and fancy of any human being. Jesus will be with us till the end of time, even though as John says in the first chapter of the Gospel, we would reject him. To accept Jesus was to be a child of God with all the freedom that is possible.

Peter and Linda Biel have a harrowing story. Their daughter Amy, a 20 year old Stanford University student and Fulbright scholar, working in South Africa in 1993 was killed by a mob of between fifty and two hundred black people.

Amy had prepared her parents for the day of her death, telling them that the frustrated and angry black South African youth shouldn’t be blamed for their violence since they were only doing what had been done to them by generations of white oppressors.

Peter now says that he and Linda harbor no grudge, no desire for revenge.

Do they forgive the murderers? Peter replies: Who are we to dispense forgiveness? We’re just two people. It’s between a person and his God. All we can say is that we harbor no grudge, no desire for reparations. And we’re free. We sleep very well at night.

I have given you examples, but I know no easy, sterile and safe way in our present world to love one’s enemies and to do good to those that harm us. Perhaps as Jesus says: “for human’s this is impossible, but with God’s help all things can be done.”

Appendix:

The story of the Amish Forgiveness

What kind of people are these? (Excerpts) by Joan Chittister, OSB

On 2^nd October. Charles Carl Roberts , a milk‑-truck driver carrying three guns and a childhood grudge stormed a one‑-room Amish schoolhouse He killed three girls and wounded seven, before committing suicide. Two more girls would die later.

The Amish spirit of forgiveness was evident Saturday, when about 30 members of the Amish community joined nearly 40 other mourners at graveside services for Roberts.

We were saddened by this particular display of viciousness. It was, of course, an attack on 10 little girls. Amish. Five dead. Five wounded. Most people called it "tragic."

Founded by a once‑-Catholic priest in the late 17 century, the Amish are a simple movement. They believe in adult baptism, pacifism, religious tolerance, separation of church and state, opposition to capital punishment, and opposition to oaths and civil office.

What really stunned the country about the attack on the small Amish schoolhouse in Pennsylvania was that the Amish community itself simply refused to hate what had hurt them. "Do not think evil of this man," the Amish grandfather told his children at one little girl's grave.

"Do not leave this area. Stay in your home here." The Amish delegation told the family of the murderer. "We forgive this man."

No, it was not the murders, not the violence that shocked us; it was the forgiveness that followed it for which we were not prepared. It was the lack of recrimination, the dearth of vindictiveness that left us amazed. Baffled. Confounded. It was the Christianity we all profess but which they practiced that left us stunned. Never had we seen such a thing.

You can't help but wonder, when you see something like this, what the world would be like today if, instead of using the fall of the Twin Towers as an excuse to invade a nation, we had simply gone to every Muslim country on earth and said, "Don't be afraid. We won't hurt you. We know that this is coming from only a fringe of society, and we ask your help in saving others from this same kind of violence."

"Too idealistic," you say. Maybe. But since we didn't try, we'll never know, will we?