THE PARISH OF Warrnambool West & Dennington

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Homilies

7 A  2020

Last week: “You have learnt how it was said...; but I say this to you.” And today the same theme continues’ You have learnt how it was said ‘Eye for eye and tooth for tooth.’ But I say this to you… You have learnt how it was said, “Love your neighbour and hate your enemy.” (Actually it wasn’t) but anyway, I say this to you. And finally, “You must therefore be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Phwaah!

For a beginning, though: An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. The Law of Moses limited the extent to which it was OK to take revenge. If a bully knocked your tooth out, the Old Law (as you know) wouldn’t let you pay him back by cutting off his hand. But surprisingly (I think) to us, you were entitled to knock out one of his teeth. If he knocked out one of your teeth, you could knock out one of his.

Jesus, on the other hand, makes no such law. What he wants is not a new law but a new attitude – an attitude of generosity. If anyone slaps your right cheek, offer him the left one too. If anyone orders you to walk a mile, walk two miles. These are not laws – they are challenges – invitations to develop a generous attitude.

I’ve been asked from time to time, “If I go to Mass on Saturday morning, will that do for Sunday?” Well, no, of course not. There’s a rule about it and Saturday morning Mass isn’t Sunday Mass. But don’t let’s get chained to the rules like dogs to a fence post. The answer lies in developing a generous attitude.

Jesus also reminds his hearers that the Old Testament told them You must love your neighbour. He adds some words – “and hate your enemy”. I suppose he was suggesting that people thought that was a reasonable interpretation. But again, rules and regulations are not enough to live by: we don’t need more rules, however helpful they may be. A mature approach demands a generous attitude, not just in favour of our circle of friends, the people we went to school with or colleagues at work: we should treat everyone, even those we may consider our enemies, with respect and even as well as we treat the people we love.

At the end of today’s Gospel, we encounter the line over which many and many a line has been written and many and many a head has been scratched: “You must therefore be perfect just as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

While I was on retreat last week I had lots of time available to consider those words and to follow up what the commentators had to say about them. The one that put it best, I think, was the one who pointed out that what is being asked is that we learn to treat with respect and even-handedness those who are very different from ourselves, just as God himself treats all of us even-handedly, to the extent, as our Gospel reminds us, of causing his sun to rise on bad people as well as good, and his rain to fall on honest and dishonest ones alike.

The same commentator reminded his readers of what St Paul wrote to the Galatians (3,28): “There are no more distinctions between Jew and Greek, slave and free, male and female, but all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”

If you and I tried to believe that and did our best to put it into practice, we’d be a long way along the road, I suspect, to achieving what Jesus asks of us in the Gospel today.

Professional Standards.

Our Parish Safeguarding Officer, overseeng and supporting our commitment to Child Safety, is Mrs Rachel Brown, telephone 0402 009 785.

Click here for the Parish Commitment Statement to Child Safety Policy.

Click here for the Parish Child Safety Policy.

Click here for the Parish Child Safety Code of Conduct.