How should God treat us, or behave and act towards us? How does God treat us or acts towards us? God knows us and God therefore has compassion towards us. God is compassionate and according to our gospel today, calls us to be compassionate as well. Psalm 78 summarises this thought very well when it says, “Do not treat us according to our sins, O Lord”. Yes, if God were to treat us according to our sins, we would not survive. But how do we treat others? Do we not treat others according to the ways they have treated us or acted towards us? Do we not classify people as good or bad depending on what they have done to us? Do we not choose our friends and identify our enemies based on how they have related to us? Do we not drift away from people based on how we see them: snobbish, arrogant, self-conceited, wicked, or too proud? Do we not break friendships, relationships and marriage because of how the other had betrayed our trust? Do not treat us according to our sins, we demand of or plead with God. This is what Jesus is asking us to do today, throughout Lent and throughout our lives. Do not treat others according to their sins, or according to their betrayals, or according to their disloyalties or according to their mistakes, or according to their failures. Treat others according to God’s love and compassion. Can we imagine living this way, where we treat others according to God’s love? It is possible. It opens us to a road of blissful freedom. It leads us to a life that cannot be touched by death. It leads us to God.
May God give us the grace to walk this journey and to live this new way of life! May God bless you all.
Amen! Lord, give me a compassionate heart!
Very inspiring and touching.
Amen. Thanks fr.
Amen, difficult as it is to love as God loves but the most beautiful gift