(Mt 18:21-35)

 

Throughout the ancient Middle East, non-proportionate (one-to-one, not cruel) retaliation was sacred law.

Forgiveness was a humiliating and absurd attitude, an incomprehensible principle for anyone experiencing any injustice or drama.

Conversely, in the dynamic of Faith, forgiving becomes a power, which not only makes the air breathable, but activates our personal destiny.

The Gospel according to Matthew devotes the greatest attention to the theme of forgiveness and the need to recompose internal frictions within the church, where each seems to want to crush the other - if only out of spiritual envy.

One wonders: is there a different counterpart to the pagan principle of retributive justice [uncuique jus suum], which by going to extremes ends up accentuating divisions?

What is the most reasonable behaviour for those who have been accepted by God, and even exorbitantly condoned?

It is not enough to oppose a good-natured value, albeit noble, indeed lofty - but for this reason, out of scale - if it excludes the time of a journey, the horizon of development that finally supplants [and does not simply gloss over: so-called 'being positive'].

The only solution free of dormant vindictiveness is to have a sense of the immeasurable, of the gratuitous prevenient - received without merit or conditions; in view of new paths.

We must first realise that the decisive element in overcoming obstacles is not our own strength or an induced voluntarism, which tears both ourselves and our brothers and sisters apart.

Only a dizzying emotion can integrate the drives and all affections, and bring to the surface the germs of the passions that give vertigo.

Personal or external ecstasies; unknown and neglected or unexpressed, to which we have not yet given space.

In fact, in the everyday summary, it seems normal to us to oppose immediate reactions and violate situations with shamelessness, then to set the stage for minor non-compliances by others - with the pretence even of suffocating those responsible for the nonsense.

Of course, even immediately after we have pleaded and promised in the ritual.

 

Mt proposes even paradoxical nuances on forgiveness - always placing his catecheses on a level of pricelessness, in the perspective of spousal and creative Faith.

And he insists on it in several passages, because the communities he addresses are very poor; still rooted in the narrowness of ancient religiosity.

As is the case not only in groups tied to the baggage of the tradition of the 'fathers' - not of the Father - the members of the communities of Galilee and Syria experienced as an affront the normality of quarrels, differing opinions, and all conflicts.

It seems unbelievable, but those who feel themselves in possession of a licence of immunity [linked to futuristic myths or sacred inhibitions, old-fashioned brakes and observances or cosmic projects of abstract subversion] find it more difficult to enter into the minute logic of coexistence, of confrontation - of disproportion, of the without-boundary, of the Gift that favours coexistence itself.

 

Peter wants to know the limits of forgiveness (v.21).

Historically, at the end of the first century, the squeamish, severe style of the synagogue and the empire [‘divide et impera’] had reappeared among believers.

The question arose and reappeared: should one stop in welcoming?

In addition, in the churches themselves, people were beginning to think that someone had sinned of lese majesty towards those who - by then hard and heartless - were used to being revered.

Veterans who were up to more than others and then doted on the minutiae of others (the weak brethren, considered subordinates, and destined for the fiscal rigour of moralising as well as penances).

 

Does the insolvent debtor of the Gospel take it out on those who owe him a few pennies?

The excessive Forgiveness of the living and true God can only be manifested to the world through a community that raises grudges and relationships to a new plane - simply more normal.

Says the Tao Tê Ching (x): "Let creatures live and feed them, let them live and not keep them as your own; work and expect nothing, let them grow and not rule them. This is the mysterious virtue'.

As a commentary, Master Wang Pi writes: "The Dao in eternity does not act, creatures transform themselves. Do not obstruct their source, do not hinder their nature. Creatures from themselves grow and satisfy themselves'.

Master Ho-shang Kung adds: "The Tao makes the ten thousand creatures grow and nourish, but it does not harm them by governing them as if they were instruments. The Tao's implementation of virtue is mysterious and obscure, nor can it be scrutinised. He wants to induce men to be like the Tao'.

 

Even today, legalistic practice exasperates minute faults, but the very experience of the disproportion between the forgiveness we receive from the Father and what we are able to offer our brothers and sisters makes us realise the need for indulgence.

Lived tolerance, in situation; not just in principle. 

Even more so in times of global crisis, the Church should be this space of God's life-giving experience. An alternative place of less cheap, less sophisticated fraternity.

 

The imperial society was harsh and without compassion, lacking space for the small and shaky, who unassumingly sought any refuge for the heart - but no religion provided an answer to their need for understanding.

Even synagogues identified material and spiritual blessings. Cloaked with prior demands, rules of purity and fulfilments, they did not offer the warmth of a welcoming place for the weak.

The trouble was that in the earliest Christian communities themselves, some put their foot down on the rigour of the rules.

Consuetudines and hierarchies they were accustomed to, demanding coexistence based on the Judaizing model - or according to the harshness of schematic, disembodied principles, lacking grip.

Moreover, as the letter of James testifies, towards the end of the first century the identical divisions of society around them, between the indigent and the well-to-do, were already beginning to manifest themselves in the churches of Christ!

The welcoming space of the communities that in the Spirit had been given the task by the Lord to enlighten the world with their seed of life as Homes for all, of alternative relations, ran the risk of once again becoming a place of conflict, judgement, punishment, condemnation.

As usual: no Good News for the least, everywhere exhausted.

And this unspeakable climate also sowed death for others, even more fortunate - but trapped in harsh reality.

What to do?

The fundamental educational function of the Church is still to include; to make it understood that the initiative can only be the creditor's (vv.21-22.27.33): he too is a "lost one" (v.25).

Only by the intimate work of awareness in Faith is the ruthlessness of competition, of retributive justice, overcome.

There is no wisdom in being pretentious in order to be someone (vv.28-30).

 

Our failures are preparing new developments - those that count, without limitation.

"So also my heavenly Father will do to you, if you do not forgive each one his brother from your heart" (v.35).

Divine forgiveness becomes effective and evident in the testimony of the Church where sisters and brothers, instead of being punctilious, are caught up in it.

They allow themselves to be guided by a vision of new heavens and a new earth.

That is why - without any effort whatsoever, indeed blessing the needs of others as territories of preparatory energies - they live the communion of resources and forgive even material debts, which are then a misery.

If not, we would always have to live in the impendence of a God of reciprocation.

And in this way we would reveal him: forgiving perhaps, but in time; retracting 'mercy' - Pope Francis would say.

So: for life under the lash of tormentors, proponents also of a mannered but contrived existence. Made of unimaginative exchanges.

A hell of anticipated pettiness, undercutting and ridiculing the Measure of the Gospel. Glad tidings that go together with differences.

 

Even the balancing of remissions would not save us from the offence (this one enormous) of stasis that levels the essences - hence from ruin.

It is beautiful and fruitful to live in the imbalance of gratuitousness, rather than in give and take. It also happens with God.

Through forgiveness, not only do we improve the obsessive atmosphere and attest to belief - e.g. in the Cross - but we build a malleable and malleable experience, with fullness of recovery and being.

From astonishment; openness, flexibility, disproportion.

The rest remains only commentary.

Echo of a subject that banally proposes to ratify the 'contract'.

Trace of an environment that remains where it is - until it allows new forces to take over.

It would be a life without marvellous developments, all weighed down in the 'quid pro quo' and the swamp of the few.

Instead, it is the active energy of Faith, the one that overcomes defined pacts. And does not condemn us to trudge on.

The ever-increasing magnanimity that comes out of automatisms shifts the gaze of small cuts.

It carries an ineffable and growing Wave. Much further than we can imagine.

 

The 'win-or-lose' alternative is false: we must get out of it.

 

 

To internalise and live the message:

 

Can you live in the imbalance of gratuitousness?

Do you accelerate and judge, or do you perceive and wait?

Is your life of Faith constitutive of the give and take typical of mundane religion, or the awareness that you are obliged to pour out the echo of what the Father has already given you?

What is the reconciliation space of your reality?

What do you concretely mean by the Gospel? 

 

 

Forgiveness and Faith: Living Encounter

 

Gratis eccentric, forward: Sacrament of humanity as such

(Lk 17:1-6)

 

The knowledge of God is not a confiscated commodity or an acquired and already foreclosed science: it moves from one action and another, unceasingly; it is realised in an ever-living Encounter, which does not block or dissolve us.

Typical, the experience of the "little ones" [mikròi v.2]. From the earliest communities of faith, they have been those who lacked security and energy; unstable and without support.

Since time immemorial, "Little Ones" have been the incipients; the new ones, who have heard of Christian brotherhood, but are sometimes forced to stand in line, aside, or give up the journey.

But the criterion of welcome, tolerance, communion even of material goods, has been the first and main catalyst for the growth of the assemblies.

Even the origin and meaning of all the formulas and signs of the liturgy.

The existential and ideal centre to which to converge. For a proactive and in itself transformative Faith.

 

In the Spirit of the Master, even for us the conciliation of friction is not simply a work of magnanimity.

It is the beginning of the future world. The beginning of an unpredictable and unspeakable adventure. And we with it suddenly reborn: coming into frank contact in Christ. He who does not extinguish us at all.

Hence the Christian forgiveness of children, which is not... 'looking positive', and 'turning a blind eye': rather, Newness of God that creates an environment of Grace, propulsive, with enormous possibilities.

Force that breaks through and paradoxically lets the dark poles meet, instead of shaking them off. Genuinely eliminating useless comparisons, words and ballasts, which block the transparent Exodus.

Dynamics that guide one to the indispensable and unavoidable: waves to shift one's gaze. Teaching one to notice one's own hysterics, to know oneself, to face anxiety, its reason; to manage situations and moments of crisis.

Mouldable virtue that places one in intimate listening to the personal essence.

Hence, solid, broad empathy that introduces new energies; it brings one's own deep states, even standard life, together... arousing other knowledge, different perspectives, unexpected relationships.

Thus without too much struggle it renews us, and curbs the loss of veracity [typical, that in favour of circumstantial manners]. It accentuates capacities and horizons of Peace - crumbling primates, swampy balances.

The discovery of new sides of the being that we are, conveys a sense of better wholeness, then spontaneously curbs external influences, dissolves prejudices, does not make one act on an emotional, impulsive basis.

Rather, it puts us in a position to reveal the hidden and astounding meaning of being. It unfolds the crucial horizon.

 

Activating 'Forgiveness' is gratuitously a surrender of one's character range, of all lost dignity, and far beyond.

By laying down sentences, the art of tolerance expands the [also intimate] gaze. It enhances and strengthens the dull sides; those we ourselves had detested.

In this eccentric way it transforms those considered distant or mediocre [mikroi] into outriders and brilliant inventors. For what was unthought of yesterday will be clarifying and driving tomorrow.

Confusions will make sense - precisely because of the thinking of the minds in crisis, and because of the action of the despised, intruders, outside of all spin and predictability.

Life of pure Faith in the Spirit: i.e., the imagination of the 'weak'... in power.

Because it is the paradoxical mechanism that makes the crossroads of history assess, activates passions, creates sharing, solves real problems.

And so it supplants difficult moments forwards (bringing us back to the true path) by orienting reality to the concrete good.

Making it fly towards itself.

 

The 'win-or-lose' alternative is false: we must get out of it. It is in such 'emptiness' and Silence that God makes His way.

Mystery of Presence, overflowing. New Covenant.