In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
What is it when you need to forgive someone?
It’s a really important thing to think about. At the center of the Gospel reading today, it’s a very common thing—just in case you thought you were alone in this—when people come to confession, a very common thing that people struggle with is trying to forgive someone. And it’s like, they want to, but they can’t, or they’re not ready to do that yet.
One of the first things I think is important to lay out about forgiveness is that it’s a process. I think in our own contemporary context, we’ve highly subjectivized forgiveness—like it’s just a feeling I have. Like, “I feel like I forgive you” or something. We do this with love, too. We do this with a lot of things. We make it completely inward and say, “It’s just me.”
And that’s not really how things are, because it’s not really how relationships are.
So, what is forgiveness? Is it just “I don’t feel mad at you anymore”? “I don’t hate you”—is that what we mean when we say, “I forgive somebody”?
What we see as an image here with Jesus is that what’s tied together in His entire ministry is when He heals people—whether it’s healing some sort of physical ailment or it’s liberating them from some sort of oppressive and demonic spirit—there’s almost always a forgiveness of sins connected to that.
And so, one of the things we can say right out from the start is that forgiveness is transformative.
That’s really important, especially since we live in a culture that’s very much dominated (whether people realize it or not) by certain Christian ideas—certain Protestant ones. For example, like the idea that you are forgiven, you’re not actually righteous, but God just considers you righteous. He forgives you “as if” you are something, right?
So this is the difference between what you’d say is de facto and de jure.
There’s this idea that forgiveness is just sort of “I’ll pretend.” Forgiveness is this pretend game that I’m going to play with you—“I’m going to pretend like the thing never happened.”
And perhaps there’s some reason for that being part of the process. Maybe I need to sort of start acting like a thing is, if I want it to be that way.
But to reduce it to that—impoverishes the understanding of what forgiveness is.
What we clearly see with Jesus is that forgiveness goes hand-in-hand with some real transformation of the person.
I think the way to think about forgiveness is: often, when we say “forgiveness,” what we’re really saying is, “I’m deciding right now that I’m going to begin the process of making this relationship with you right again—as it was in the past, and maybe even better than it was.”
And to do that requires an incredible amount of vulnerability and humility in that moment. And both of those aren’t possible unless we somehow make a sacrifice. And the sacrifice is the slaying of our own ego in that moment.
So what forgiveness is… is a death and a resurrection.
The possibility for a relationship that’s broken to be mended back together—the way this happens is the same way Christ renews all things: it’s a death and a rebirth.
To humble myself is a death of the ego.
And if we’re to put that to death in that moment—because to reach out to forgive someone is a risk—it’s often part of why it’s hard to forgive someone. It’s a little bit dangerous, especially if there’s real harm involved in that relationship. So it requires, again, the willingness to take on potential risk for myself. That requires some level of selflessness—to do that for the sake of the other person in that relationship.
In order for forgiveness to fully happen, there has to be some death and rebirth—some sort of transformation of the person.
And this is what’s truly real: there’s no way to grow. There’s no way to be healed or transformed that doesn’t require a crucifixion—a death of some kind.
We see that in the Gospel with Jesus. It’s an image of what forgiveness is: it’s the acceptance to begin the process of the death of my ego in order to rescue that relationship. That I’m willing to make that sacrifice in the hope that things can be put back together again, as best they can.
So what does that mean?
It means, like we see with Jesus, that we have to love people and be willing to do that with people who are not very lovable. Who are not likable. Who are annoying and difficult—who probably very likely don’t deserve any of the love or second chances we’re giving.
But the real source of our courage to forgive other people—and to enter down this process of some sort of death and rebirth with them and ourselves—is the fact that we know (and this is at the core of why we call it Good News) that we don’t deserve anything.
Actually, everything we have is a gift.
And we ourselves have fallen short in so many ways that we see and don’t see—of our potential. And that’s exactly what sin is. It’s a falling short. It’s a missing of the mark of what our real potential is.
And we know that we’ve been forgiven exceedingly.
So it is our own realization of Christ’s forgiveness—and I mean this word realization in both senses. That it recognizes a reality that already is—we are forgiven. And realization in that it makes real that thing at the same time. It makes real that we have tasted and participated in the grace of that forgiveness.
And what is that forgiveness that Christ gives us?
Is it merely being alleviated from the guilt of feeling bad about a thing?
No.
It’s a forgiveness that has changed us. And that—that’s the source of our ability to forgive others. Christ died and rose again for us to put that relationship right.
And we know that the way of the cross—the way of death and rebirth—works.
And that we can do it with other people. And we can do it with all the areas of our life.
That’s Good News.
Because what that means is—there’s second chances. It means things can be different.
That’s our joy.
Glory to Jesus Christ.
Glory forever.
Watch The Full Homily On YouTube 👇🏿👇🏼👇🏻👇