Homily for the 24th Sunday of Ordinary Time
The master said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you your entire debt because you begged me to. Should you not have had pity on your fellow servant, as I had pity on you?’ Mt 18:21-35
Who is the person you need to forgive? If you’re having trouble identifying who that is, it’s probably the one who appears in your thoughts in the middle of the night and keeps you from having a good night’s sleep, or the person who keeps appearing in this video clip you replay in your head, or the person you cross the street to avoid, or the person whose very name causes your stomach muscles to tighten up.
Forgiving others is important to our own health and wellbeing. Nelson Mandela said not forgiving is like “drinking a cup of poison and then waiting for the other person to die.”
More to the point, forgiving others is important to God. In the parable that Jesus tells on forgiveness (Mt 18:21-35), the Master put his servant in prison and handed him over to the torturers. The Master didn’t do this because the servant owed the Master a huge sum of money. The Master did this because the servant did not forgive another servant. Another reminder that God makes a big deal out of forgiving others.
If you don’t forgive, it is like handing yourself over to the torturers and sentencing yourself to prison. I call this the “Prison of Unforgiveness”, or P.U. for short.
As you enter this dark place you hear the warden announce, “Welcome to the Prison of Unforgiveness!” You pass through the gates and walk down the hallway to your cell. On the way, you hear the grumbling and complaining of all the other unforgiving inmates. The unforgiving tend to do a lot of commiserating. You slam the cell door shut. With a loud click, the door locks you behind the bars. There you sit and rot in your own bitterness and resentment.
Why are you in Prison of Unforgiveness? At some point in time, someone hurt you, made you feel small, or caused you pain. Someone might have said something you found insulting or detestable. This could be a person you know, a political figure in the news, a ghost from your past, or some imaginary enemy or threat.
In your cell, you relive this emotional pain and distress over and over again. You join the chorus of all the unforgiving cell mates as they sing their dirges of indignation.
Behind the bars, your twisted imagination runs wild. You make unreasonable demands upon your offender – punishments that will never come or retribution that will never happen.
The bars of the Prison of Unforgiveness come between you and your healthy relationships. No one wants to visit or receive a call from someone who is in the Prison of Unforgiveness. No one wants to hear the same old story over and over again.
In the prison of Unforgiveness, time does NOT heal all wounds. In the Prison of Unforgiveness, you get no credit for time already served. You’re in there for life, and maybe in there into the life-after life.
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There is hope. There is a huge difference between the Prison of Unforgiveness and a regular prison. In the Prison of Unforgiveness, the door unlocks from the inside of the prison cell. You hold the key. You have the power to release yourself. In biblical language you have the power to bind and the power to loose – and that includes your very own soul.
Why don’t you turn the key? Why don’t you release yourself from this dreadful place?
You might think that if you turn the key, that is the same as saying that whatever happened was ok or that you didn’t get hurt. That is not forgiveness, that is denial. Forgiveness is actually a deeper awareness and understanding of the offense.
You might think if you turn the key, that is the same as saying all differences have been reconciled. On the contrary, when you forgive someone it doesn’t mean you’re now the best of friends. When you forgive, you sometimes don’t have to be in a relationship at all.
You might think if you turn the key, you will remove the boundaries that keep you safe and from further harm. True forgiveness, however, brings about a better respect for boundaries and protection from being a door mat.
When you turn the key, you are making a conscious decision to let go.
Forgiveness is not a feeling. If you’re waiting for it to feel right or for the pain to go away, you may be in your cell a long time. Forgiveness is not conditional. If you’re waiting for the other person to do something, you may be in your cell a long time.
Forgiveness is a deliberate act of will. By turning the key, you deliberately and consciously commit to letting go of thoughts of resentment, indignation, and revenge.
When you turn the key, you not only unlock the cell door, but you open the way for the power of God to enter into your life. God can’t reach someone who has locked his or her self behind the bars of the Prison of Unforgiveness. To turn the key and forgive another person is an act of surrender to God’s will and extreme trust that God will guide you out of these prison walls.
True forgiveness unites our actions with the cross of Jesus Christ, the preeminent symbol of how much God has forgiven us and at what great lengths we need to go to forgive others. The wounds of Jesus are like portals through which God’s grace can flow into us, forgiving us our trespasses and giving us the same power to forgive those who trespass against us.
Here is my secret to stay out of the Prison of Unforgiveness. When I have that unsavory thought about a particular person, when I recall the wounds of the past, or when my mind starts to go to that dark place of resentment, I say a “Hail Mary”. When I am done with the prayer, my mind has moved on. Sometimes the thought comes right back. I repeat the process. Usually after one or two, I am no longer being tortured behind the bars of the Prison of Unforgiveness. After a few weeks of consciously directing my mind to a better place, the thought hardly returns at all.
Don’t let yourself be tortured in the Prison of Unforgiveness. You hold the key. Open the cell door, and let God guide you into a new way of living.