Forgive and love your enemy
Fr. Anthony Le
So my dear brothers and sisters, that was my father. Now as I look back I realize that being a good Catholic. Once upon a time, he wanted to be a priest also until he met my mom. he just wanted to he just wanted to imitate the one he called Master, Lord, and Savior Jesus. In today's gospel we all heard it clearly that our Lord wants you and I to imitate him, and therefore imitate the heavenly father. be merciful, be perfect, and the most difficult thing that he asked us to do is to love our enemies. not the kind of cozy affectionate love. no. the kind of love that goes to show our compassion, our desire for the good of the others, and that's this kind of love. and that love has to involve concrete action. Our Lord says clearly, it has to do with prayer, it has to do with forgiveness, it has to do with you and I make a bold commitment. By doing so, we imitate our heavenly father. think for a moment, and I consider my father to be a wise man. then, that is a practical thing to do to end the circle of violence, circle of hatred. imagine for a moment, my cousin went nuts ,hurting this man, putting his family. What about his relatives? What about other families? too. they're probably gonna take Vengeance against us. and my father did not want that. What if we kill him? what if we hurt him so badly that the rest of my cousin would get locked in or prison themselves, who would suffer. so it was a good decision to stop the circle of violence. and exactly what our Lord wants you and I to think about.
Why are we giving in to this hatred ? isn't that the world is bad enough because of that? imagine the world taking place between nations, imagine families, imagine us all holding Grudge, hatred, Harbor all of that bitterness and anger in our heart. and therefore we hurt ourselves first, by doing so, we trap ourselves in this prison of our own need for Revenge, Blood for Blood, eye for an eye. and now Lord's asking to stop it. To recognize it, make that determination, embracing the very difficult thing. the pain, the loss, due to things that others have done unto us. embrace it, carry it, and yet find a place in our heart to really move forward by ending that Circle of vengeance. vengeance belongs to God. so my dear brothers and sister, perhaps that is the first reason why, a practical reason why, we should not keep this hatred, anger, bitterness in our own heart.
The second more powerful reason to love our enemies, to show them compassion, is that we wanted to really imitate our Lord. look at him on the cross, look at him how he treated his own enemies. the people who crucified him, the people who plotted to kill him, the people who actually slander him, the people who ruined not only his reputation, but his own family, his own life as well, on the cross. and what did he do? What did he do? He cried out to the heavenly father: "Father forgive them for what they know not" he gathers all the strength he has left, and begs the father to not punish them, to not hold them accountable for what they have done unto me, but forgive them.
And our Lord knows nothing other than love and compassion and forgiveness. 這because he knows, he knows that we Are Not Angels, We are human beings. we got to learn like our Lord, Separate the sins committed and the person who committed those sins. sin, it has always been done wrong. hurting, killing, stealing, cheating, you name it, everything our Lord has named is always wrong no matter excuses. however the person who did it may not know fully, may not understand, maybe under influence of any kind. evil influence, bad habit, a culture he or she grew up with no not better way to do. so our Lord sees a human heart that we have the capacity to return. just like Paul, who killed Christian, who hunted Christian, who thought he did a good thing for God. Like Matthew, like Peter, like the rest of the Apostles, they're not angels. They were men with problems, with flaws. but our Lord see through them and that's the reason why, my dear brothers and sister, we should imitate him, because we don't want, we don't want to see people as the sins committed, we don't want to objectify people with that kind of punishment, because our Lord does not look at you and me in that way. so by stopping, realizing, that person by forgiving them, by forgiving others, the enemies, we showed them a way out. We showed them a way out of Their Own Prison, of their own condemnation. And by doing so, we open the Gate of Heaven not only for them and for us as well.
Our Lord has said clearly: if we don't forgive our brothers and sisters, heaven forgive us. we have that power, we have that power. Fascinating isn't it? the power to forgive, the power to Open the Gate of Heaven, the power to really help somebody return to the path of goodness and therefore salvation, belongs to you and to me. Our Lord has shared that with you and with me. so my brothers and sisters, exercise that power, while it's difficult and our Lord has asked us to make that effort. following God, following Christ, it's not an easy thing. It's hard and difficult. However, the end goal, the end destination it's awesome. It's awesome. For that reason, it makes sense that we learn to forgive from our heart, and we learn to pray, and we learn to exercise that power to forgive, to embrace our enemies in such a way that the world could be a better place. so my brothers and sisters, I believe we could do it.
Just like St. Paul has said, the spirit of God has been poured into our hearts. The Same Spirit has inspired our Lord to give up his life, The Same Spirit has extended the mercy of the heavenly father to All, The Same Spirit is in us. and we are his beloved children, we could do exactly like our Heavenly Father. Like Father Like Son, like father like daughter, and may God grant us such courage to do so.
寬恕與愛仇
20 年前，我哥哥在酒吧裡為了小事與人發生衝突，在格鬥中他的肩膀被砍傷。 為了保護自己，右手也被劈成兩半。 最後他游過河保存了生命。 感謝天主，活了下來。 事後，我父親和堂兄弟們都非常憤怒想要報復。 我叔叔是城裡臭名昭彰的流氓。 堂兄弟們也都是幫派的頭目。 他們聚眾將武器裝滿了麵包車，準備好好的為他們的小表弟報仇。 我父親以前是一名軍人。 我看過他徒手與手持武器的人打架。 他應對這類事情有些經驗。 他有幾個方案：讓堂兄們為此事瘋狂的報復，或是提起訴訟經由法院來解決。 但是他選了一條不同的路—他去拜訪了那傷害我弟弟的母親。 談話結束後，他決定不追究這件事，只收了五百塊錢的醫藥費。 後來他向我們解釋為什麼他要這樣做。 首先，這是位單親媽媽，這個年輕人才二十多歲，人生才開始。 如果表弟們報仇傷害他，或是經由訴訟把他送進監獄，他的前程ㄧ定會比現在更糟糕。 所以他決定原諒他，給這年輕人再一次機會。
兄弟姐妹們，這就是我父親。 現在回想起來，我發現他是一個很好的天主教徒。 他曾經想要當神父，但是他遇到了我媽媽。 他所做的選擇就是從他的導師，救主耶穌那兒學來的。 在今天的福音中，主耶穌清楚的告訴我們要效法天父變得更仁慈，更完美。耶穌的要求最困難的就是要愛我們的敵人。 天父的愛不是那種狹意的情愛。 不是的。耶穌要我們在愛中表現出同情心，渴望滿全別人的福祉。 這種愛必須有具體的行動。 耶穌的愛與祈禱和寬赦有關。他要你和我做出效法天父的承諾。 我父親是一個聰明的人，他採取了行動來結束暴力和仇恨的循環。這是一件確實可行的選擇。 想想看，如果堂兄們傷害了這個人和他的家人。 那麼他們的親戚呢？還有其他與他有關的家庭呢？ 他們也可能對我們進行報復。 父親不希望這件事演變成這樣子。 萬ㄧ我們殺了他，或使他受到重大的傷害使我的表弟們被關入牢房，那麼到底是誰會繼續受苦呢？ 所以停止暴力的循環是一個很好的決定。 這正是主耶穌要我們做的。
我為什麼會屈服於仇恨之下呢？ 看看這個世界是多麼的糟糕。在國家，家庭，和所有人之間都懷恨在心。我們將所有的痛苦和憤怒都埋藏在心裡，它傷害了自己，將我們困在報復、以血還血、以眼還眼的牢籠中。 天主不要我們繼續受束縛，所以祂要我們下定決心做一件非常困難的事—愛仇。如果他人傷害了我們，天主要我們在心中找到一個地方來擁抱和攜帶這些痛苦和憤怒，用結束復仇循環的行動來解放束縛向前邁進。 不要忘記：復仇是天主的事。 兄弟姐妹們，要把仇恨、憤怒和痛苦從你的心中解放出去。
第二個要愛仇的原因是：我們要效法救主耶穌。 看看在十字架上的耶穌是如何對待祂的敵人。那些誹謗祂，密謀殺害祂，將祂釘在十字架上的人。這些人摧毀了耶穌的名聲，毀了祂家，最後又取了祂的生命。在十字架上耶穌向天父呼求：“父啊，原諒他們吧，他們不知道自己做了什麼“。耶穌用了他生命的最後力量，求天父不要懲罰陷害祂的人，求天主原諒他們。
主耶穌就是愛、憐憫和寬恕。 他知道我們不是天使，我們是凡人。 就向主耶穌ㄧ樣，我們要將罪，和犯罪的人分開。 罪，就是錯的。 傷害、殺戮、偷竊、欺騙，不管怎麼說，都是錯的。 但是那個犯罪的人在犯罪時可能並不了解他做了些什麼事，他可能受到外來的影響，譬如：邪惡的影響，壞習慣，成長過程中錯誤的教導，等等，不知道他犯了罪。 耶穌總是給每一個犯罪的人悔改的機會。 聖保祿追捕殺害基督徒卻以為他是在為天行道。聖瑪竇，聖伯多祿，和其他門徒們都不是無罪的天使。 他們都有問題、有缺陷。 但是主耶穌看穿了他們，給了他們悔改的機會。讓我們效法主不以罪來論斷犯罪的人，因為主並不是這樣的眼光來看待我們。 因此我們必須原諒得罪我們的人，原諒其他的人，也原諒我們的敵人。讓他們走出內心罪惡的監禁、擺脫那無止境的自責。 這樣子，我們不僅為他人，也為自己打開了天堂之門。
主很清楚的告訴我們：如果你不寬恕自己的兄弟姊妹，你就進不了天國。寬恕的力量是如此的強大，它可以開天堂的門，幫人走善良的路得到天主的救贖。主給了我們寬恕的能力，讓我們努力跟隨天主來學習基督的寬恕。學習如何祈禱，如何用寬恕來擁抱敵人，使世界變得更美好。 兄弟姐妹們，我們可以做得到。
聖保祿說，聖神已經澆灌在我們的心中。 聖神啟發了主耶穌以犧牲自己的生命來寬恕我們的罪債。聖神已將天父的慈悲賜給所有的人，聖神也就在我們的心中。 我們是天主心愛的子女，可以從天父那裏學到寬恕。 有其父必有其子，必有其女，願天主賜予我們寬恕的勇氣。