We may harshly judge the mother of the two sons of Zebedee. What nerve this woman had to command Jesus that her sons sit at his right and left in the kingdom of heaven! But we often do the same especially in our thoughts. We look at others and think we are holier than they are and deserve special recognition from God. We think others are selfish with their time because they don’t make time to do the acts of charity that we do. But if we are keeping score than our actions mean nothing! We may judge those who are wealthy or successful thinking they don’t deserve it, or feel sorry for myself because I deserve it, not them. Just because we don’t verbalize our thoughts, our hearts are full of indignation just as the disciples’ were.
In the first reading, Jeremiah is calling out to God, his enemies are plotting against him and they want to destroy him. They are going to do it by carefully noting everything he says and try to use his words to ruin him. This reading was a wakeup call to me this time last year. A priest had hurt me deeply and I found my heart growing bitter. His homilies and meditations that were once a source of inspiration had become an opportunity for me to seek out his hypocrisy and I wanted to prove him wrong. I wanted his followers to know that he is not the wonderful person that they all think he is. I wanted to knock him off the pedestal that he had been placed upon by so many people. And while I never let others know what I was feeling, these feelings were eating away at my soul. My heart was full of anger and hatred and I was being consumed by sin. Those words from Jeremiah were a slap in the face; I was doing the very thing that the people of Judah were doing. I immediately felt full of shame and prayed for a change of heart. I went to confession seeking God’s mercy. And while it was hard to see I could be that heartless, I thanked God for opening my eyes to a side of me that I never knew I had. I always thought of myself as compassionate and accepting of others.
I am so thankful that I am in a better place. Whenever I pray the Our Father, I especially focus on the words, “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” I certainly don’t want God’s forgiveness to be measured by my forgiveness of this person. I pray for God to help me to love as He loves and to burn away all that is not of Him. God has allowed our paths to cross again and my heart is filled with peace. I can listen to his homilies without judgment and am even inspired at times.
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