June 18, 2013
Tuesday
11th Week
in Ordinary Time
1st Reading: 2 Cor 8:1–9
Gospel: Mt 5:43–48
Jesus said to his disciples, “You have heard that it was said: Love your neighbor and do not do good to your enemy. But this I tell you: Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in Heaven. For he makes his sun rise on both the wicked and the good, and he gives rain to both the just and the unjust.
“If you love those who love you, what is special about that? Do not even tax collectors do as much? And if you are friendly only to your friends, what is so exceptional about that? Do not even the pagans do as much? For your part you shall be righteous and perfect in the way your heavenly Father is righteous and perfect.”
D@iGITAL-EXPERIENCE
(Daily Gospel in the Assimilated Life Experience)
Hearts are not only capable of hating but also of loving. Jesus’ Commandment of love, therefore, is not contrary to human nature. We should then stop justifying our vindictiveness with the overused maxim: “Sapagka’t ako ay tao lamang” unless we shift the accent of the word “lamang” to the last syllable so that the whole phrase would mean “Because I am human, I am better off (lamang) compared to other creatures.”
If the heart is capable of both loving and hating, why not minimize the hating and maximize the loving? Proactive Christians successfully minimize the hating by concentrating on loving even when there are no reasons to love. By the principle of accumulation, frequent little acts of love can snowball into a great boulder formidable enough to crash our structures of hatred. Frequent loving means loving all people all the time in all circumstances notwithstanding the past nor the present nor the future. Maximizing occasions to love is minimizing our chances to hate.
This strategy is in keeping with today’s Gospel mandate. The old law was to love the neighbor and hate the enemy. But the call for Christians is to outgrow this selective loving because the Heavenly Father excludes no one. He makes the sun rise on both the bad and the good, and gives rain to both the just and the unjust.
The moral anguish that hatred imposes upon us gives our enemy more power over us than he already has. Hatred is like a screw that digs deeper into our being strengthening the clout of the enemy over us. Aren’t we the losers in the long run? By loving the way Jesus does, we do not only spare ourselves from this defeat but also live up to the standard of perfection Jesus has set when he said: “be righteous and perfect in the way your heavenly Father is righteous and perfect.”—Rev. Fr. Dan Domingo P. delos Angeles, Jr., DM. Email: [email protected]. Website: www.frdan.org.
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