Mt.18: 15-20
One of the most vicious genocides that registered in our times is in Rwanda. In April 1994 the streets and streams of Rwanda were flooded with barbarity. 8,00,000 people were brutally massacred by violent groups in a short period of a hundred days. “Neighbour turned on neighbour, the family turned on family, and love turned to hate.” every family had a tragic story to share, most of the families lost some of their family members and a few families completely vanished from the face of the earth.
Mr. Andrew and Mr. Callixte were thick friends before the genocide. However, the internal violence divided them and they became members of opponent groups. The group that Callixte was a member killed Andrew’s wife and the entire family. Callixte was imprisoned for a long time for the crime that he had done… after this bloodshed, many families who fled from Rwanda came back in 1996 and the Christian NGO ‘World Vision,’ started reconciliation and peacebuilding based on the gospel values. Their tireless efforts made an enormous change in society and it has been going on even after twenty years.
‘Now I want peace in my heart; please forgive me.’ I don’t want to keep connected to the bad memories of when you did evil to me. I don’t want to be a prisoner of my pain,” These are the words repeated by every person during the recompilation process that opened themselves to the healing grace of God and helped them to recognize the presence of goodness that they experienced in their community once upon a time, the goodness that knitted them as one community. The realization of the need for forgiveness brought back people like Callixte and Andre to the same old good friendship…
The most important principles of Jesus’ teachings are ‘love and forgiveness.’ These two virtues go hand in hand. We need to grow simultaneously in both these qualities as we get deepened in our spiritual life. Every instance of Jesus’ life was a celebration of love and forgiveness. The basic principle behind salvation history itself is these two virtues ‘Love and forgiveness.’ Jn. 3:16 states: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.” The salvation history summarizes this unconditional love and forgiveness that God has for humanity.
In today’s gospel, Jesus inspires us to practice these virtues in our day to day life that we may be worthy enough to be called as children of our Abba Father. One of the major reasons for the break up in relationships is the absence of love and forgiveness. It is quite natural that differences of opinion may come up in our friendships because all of us are unique and we think differently. We need not agree to the views of the other yet it shouldn’t be a cause for the hatred towards the other.
In this journey of relating to the other very often, we are not ready to clarify the differences of opinion through the means of dialogue. When differences of opinion occur, we tend to cut down our relationship from the other by way of not interacting with that person or avoiding that person, etc. Jesus instructs us to keep away our ego and enter into dialogue with that person. When we glance through the history of humanity we realize that the worst of problems such as war, famine, etc. could have solved if people were ready to enter into dialogue and ready to accept and forgive the failure of the other.
Jesus says that if that person is not ready to accept two or three people who are acceptable and credible for both the parties should be approached quite often we are reluctant to seek help from others and try to give it up when the first attempt fails. It is true when a person is filled with anger, he/she may not be able to accept the other not willing to have an open dialogue. In this regard, Jesus opens up a further possibility that if the person is not ready to accept the witness that you are invited then the next stage is to involve the community. Jesus recognizes the collective wisdom of the community in peacebuilding. If that person is wise enough to receive the wisdom of the community most of the problems could be solved at this stage.
Again Jesus speaks about a possibility beyond the third option that is to treat one who is ready to reconcile with us as a gentile or tax collector. When we understand these words from a Jewish perspective, we may think that we should treat them as lost sheep and beyond redemption in line with Jewish thinking. How did Jesus treat them? He was known as the friend of the tax collectors and some of the significant miracles of his public life were worked for the gentiles and some of the ‘Faith – Role models’ that he presented to Jews were gentiles such as the Syrophoenician woman, the tremendous faith of the Centurion, etc.
We can’t authentically live our Christian life unless we are not living in love. Finally, Jesus says: “Where two or three gathered in my name, I am there among them.” (Mt. 18:20) here Jesus is stressing on the community dimension of prayers. We can’t have a heart that hates our fellow brethren and at the same time being in communion with Jesus. When we analyze the life of Jesus, we realize that Jesus could have found several reasons to abandon his disciples after his resurrection due to their lack of faith, betrayal, denial, abandoning him and securing tier own life nevertheless Jesus goes in search of them and bringing them back and initiate the process of reconciliation with him and with each other. let us surrender all our bitter feelings to Jesus and invite him to our life that we may be humble enough to enter into dialogue with our fellow brethren and experience the presence of Jesus in our communities.