20240424 COMPASSION FOR THE OPPRESSORS
24 April 2026, Friday, 3rd Week of Easter
First reading | Acts 9:1-20 |
This man is my chosen instrument to bring my name before the pagans
Saul was still breathing threats to slaughter the Lord’s disciples. He had gone to the high priest and asked for letters addressed to the synagogues in Damascus, that would authorise him to arrest and take to Jerusalem any followers of the Way, men or women, that he could find.
Suddenly, while he was travelling to Damascus and just before he reached the city, there came a light from heaven all round him. He fell to the ground, and then he heard a voice saying, ‘Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?’ ‘Who are you, Lord?’ he asked, and the voice answered, ‘I am Jesus, and you are persecuting me. Get up now and go into the city, and you will be told what you have to do.’ The men travelling with Saul stood there speechless, for though they heard the voice they could see no one. Saul got up from the ground, but even with his eyes wide open he could see nothing at all, and they had to lead him into Damascus by the hand. For three days he was without his sight, and took neither food nor drink.
A disciple called Ananias who lived in Damascus had a vision in which he heard the Lord say to him, ‘Ananias!’ When he replied, ‘Here I am, Lord’, the Lord said, ‘You must go to Straight Street and ask at the house of Judas for someone called Saul, who comes from Tarsus. At this moment he is praying, having had a vision of a man called Ananias coming in and laying hands on him to give him back his sight.’
When he heard that, Ananias said, ‘Lord, several people have told me about this man and all the harm he has been doing to your saints in Jerusalem. He has only come here because he holds a warrant from the chief priests to arrest everybody who invokes your name.’ The Lord replied, ‘You must go all the same, because this man is my chosen instrument to bring my name before pagans and pagan kings and before the people of Israel; I myself will show him how much he himself must suffer for my name.’ Then Ananias went. He entered the house, and at once laid his hands on Saul and said, ‘Brother Saul, I have been sent by the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on your way here so that you may recover your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.’ Immediately it was as though scales fell away from Saul’s eyes and he could see again. So he was baptised there and then, and after taking some food he regained his strength.
He began preaching in the synagogues, ‘Jesus is the Son of God.’
Responsorial Psalm | Psalm 116(117) |
Go out to the whole world; proclaim the Good News.
or
Alleluia!
O praise the Lord, all you nations,
acclaim him all you peoples!
Go out to the whole world; proclaim the Good News.
or
Alleluia!
Strong is his love for us;
he is faithful for ever.
Go out to the whole world; proclaim the Good News.
or
Alleluia!
Gospel Acclamation | cf.Lk24:46,26 |
Alleluia, alleluia!
It was ordained that the Christ should suffer
and rise from the dead,
and so enter into his glory.
Alleluia!
Or: | Jn6:56 |
Alleluia, alleluia!
He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood
lives in me, and I live in him,
says the Lord.
Alleluia!
Gospel | John 6:52-59 |
My flesh is real food and my blood is real drink
The Jews started arguing with one another: ‘How can this man give us his flesh to eat?’ they said. Jesus replied:
‘I tell you most solemnly,
if you do not eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood,
you will not have life in you.
Anyone who does eat my flesh and drink my blood
has eternal life,
and I shall raise him up on the last day.
For my flesh is real food
and my blood is real drink.
He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood
lives in me
and I live in him.
As I, who am sent by the living Father,
myself draw life from the Father,
so whoever eats me will draw life from me.
This is the bread come down from heaven;
not like the bread our ancestors ate:
they are dead,
but anyone who eats this bread will live for ever.’
He taught this doctrine at Capernaum, in the synagogue.
COMPASSION FOR THE OPPRESSORS
SCRIPTURE READINGS: [ACTS 9:1-20; PS 117; JOHN 6:52-59]
As Christians, we are called to protect the rights and dignity of every human person. We are called to be prophets of justice and love, especially for those who are oppressed, discriminated or marginalised. If we are concerned with the poor and the oppressed, it is because Jesus is identified with every man, woman and child. By assuming our humanity, Jesus knows our weaknesses, our struggles, our pains and temptations. This was what Jesus said to Saul — that in persecuting the Christians, he was, in actual fact, persecuting Him. He said, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting!” (9:4-5).
However, our focus should not just be on the victims, but we need to bring conversion to the oppressors and those who are accomplices to the crimes against humanity. We must not also forget the perpetrators of the insidious crimes against humanity. We live in a broken world. The oppressors often themselves were first victims. They, too, need the Gospel. We need to extend compassion towards them. The danger is that in defending the weak, we might become so vindictive toward the oppressor that we lose our capacity for mercy and seek only their destruction. “He who fights with monsters might take care lest he thereby become a monster.” (Friedrich Nietzsche)
We are to proclaim the Good News to the whole world, including the persecutors. Saul represents the oppressor in today’s Scripture reading. But he, too, was blinded like many of us. Hence, they too need our compassion. God chose Saul because He saw in him a man who was misguided but passionate. Many of those who commit crimes against humanity have a conscience that is numbed or warped. Like Ananias, we are sent to enlighten them so that they, too, will become champions of truth. But some of us would find it difficult to have compassion for such people because we feel that such offenders and perpetrators deserve a heavy punishment or even death. Hence, we can appreciate why Ananias was repulsed at the idea of reaching out to Saul. He retorted, “Lord, several people have told me about this man and all the harm he has been doing to your saints in Jerusalem. He has only come here because he holds a warrant from the chief priests to arrest everybody who invokes your name.”
Ananias had to learn the lesson that, regardless of whether one is a victim or the oppressor, he or she is our brother and sister. He or she, too, is a child of God, created in His image and likeness, called to share in the life and love of God. And with that realisation, he went in faith to Saul. “He entered the house, and at once laid his hands on Saul and said, ‘Brother Saul, I have been sent by the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on your way here so that you may recover your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.'” Everyone, therefore, must be dealt with in fraternal charity because God loves the good and bad alike.
We too must study the make-up of the oppressors as well. They, too, have a story to tell. They, too, have come from a situation where they were rejected, oppressed, and persecuted. In their woundedness and fear, they too sought to take revenge on the world. They can only think of themselves and not others because life has become for them a matter of survival. They never received love and therefore could not love. And in the case of Saul, he was never loved for his sake. He believed his worth was something to be earned — measured only by the weight of his achievements. So he relied on himself to seek perfection based on his own strength. When he failed, he became harsh towards himself and, therefore, also intolerant of others. Our tendency to condemn others for their sins is often an indication of our own inability to accept our brokenness. Because we cannot embrace our own imperfections, we find ourselves unable to offer compassion to others.
Besides personal sins committed by individuals, we also live in a culture of sin. If we have become so inward-looking and selfish, it is also because we live in a world of materialism, consumerism and relativism — all by-products of secularism and globalisation. We are very much influenced in the name of freedom by a culture of permissiveness, pornography and lust. So even as individuals trying to live an authentic life, we find ourselves sucked into a system that overwhelms us. Of course, this does not mean that we can ascribe all blame to the structure. But let us not just deal with the individual; we must also deal with the structures as well.
Thus, in championing for justice, we must not become unjust to the unjust. We need prayerful discernment. Otherwise, our good intentions and zeal for justice can at times be misguided, as in the case of Saul. We will cause more harm than good, fighting for justice for the innocent and becoming unjust in dealing with the offenders. So, like Ananias, before we act, we must pray and discern. Instead of just raising our concerns to God like Ananias did, we must also, in prayer, listen attentively to what the Lord wants to reveal to us. When our mindset is fixed, we might act foolishly, forgetting that God’s wisdom is greater than man’s wisdom.
For that reason, those who champion the cause of the poor and the oppressed must also be people of prayer and contemplation. In the encyclical, “God is love” (Deus caritas est), Pope Benedict wrote, “charity workers need a “formation of the heart”. They need to be led to an encounter with God in Christ, which then awakens their love and opens their spirits to others. As a result, love of neighbour will no longer be a commandment imposed on them, but instead, a consequence deriving from their faith; a faith which becomes active through love (cf. Gal 5:6). (Deus caritas est 31) “Prayer, as a means of drawing ever new strength from Christ, is concretely and urgently needed. People who pray are not wasting their time, even though the situation appears desperate and seems to call for action alone. Piety does not undermine the struggle against the poverty of our neighbours, however extreme.” (Deus caritas est 36)
In the face of the activism and the growing secularism of many Christians engaged in charitable work, Pope Benedict writes, “A personal relationship with God and an abandonment to his will can prevent man from being demeaned and save him from falling prey to the teaching of fanaticism and terrorism. An authentically religious attitude prevents man from presuming to judge God, accusing him of allowing poverty and failing to have compassion for his creatures. When people claim to build a case against God in defence of man, on whom can they depend when human activity proves powerless?”
So today, if we want to find the strength to love our brothers and sisters, and to take risks for them, we must first see them with the love of the Lord and for the love of the Lord. We must be ready to take risks in helping both the oppressed and the victims. Like Ananias, we must have the courage to take risks for the love of our brothers and sisters. Like Ananias, we are called even to reach out to our enemies and the enemies of society. If the Lord asks us to reach out to them, like Ananias, even if we feel angry with them, we must, like Jesus, have a heart of the Compassionate One for them. For all we know, when we convert them, they become the potent force to change the world as Saul did. Only those who have faith in the love and power of the Lord dare to take the risk and go beyond our comfort zone. Ananias, in spite of his initial fears and inability to forgive Saul, who had probably killed most of his own friends and relatives as well, went to heal Saul and restored him to health. This was because he trusted more in the power of Jesus to transform life and people than in his fears and insecurity. God is asking us to make an act of faith in Him and go beyond mere human logic and calculation.
This courage and strength to take risks and to act in faith is precisely what the Gospel is asking of us. We read that the Jews “started arguing with one another: ‘How can this man give us his flesh to eat?'” Are we ready to believe in the promises of the Lord who comes to give us strength and food through the Bread of life, both His Word and the Eucharist? By our faith in His real presence in the Eucharist and sharing in His flesh and blood, we too draw strength from Jesus as He did from His Father to risk our lives for those who are suffering, healing them and enlightening those whose conscience is dead or dull. Through the Eucharist, too, we come to identify His presence in our fellowmen even more.
Finally, through the Eucharist, we are transformed into His likeness and empowered to love even when love is not reciprocated. There is a real danger for those who champion the rights of the marginalised, that in the face of opposition, they may react with anger and vindictiveness on one hand; and on the other, be so consumed by the demands and suffering of those they serve that they succumb to burnout on the other. For this reason, all the more, those of us who work for the poor and the oppressed must come to the Lord in the Eucharist, contemplate on His passion, death and resurrection; and receive Him in the Eucharist so that, nurtured and healed, enlightened and empowered, we will never be without divine strength to continue to give and give, like Jesus, unto death. Otherwise, just depending on ourselves and our capacity to love, we will very soon be depleted of all energy and strength, resulting in us becoming edgy, irritable, angry, impatient and anxious. The cause of disillusionment in ministry is always because we carry out the work of Jesus without remaining in Him and depending on Him alone. So if we do not wish to be weighed down and be overwhelmed by the demands of ministry, let us constantly come to the Eucharistic table and be fed with the Bread of life, His body and blood, His Word and be filled with His Holy Spirit.
Best Practices for Using the Daily Scripture Reflections
- Encounter God through the spirit of prayer and the scripture by reflecting and praying the Word of God daily. The purpose is to bring you to prayer and to a deeper union with the Lord on the level of the heart.
- Daily reflections when archived will lead many to accumulate all the reflections of the week and pray in one sitting. This will compromise your capacity to enter deeply into the Word of God, as the tendency is to read for knowledge rather than a prayerful reading of the Word for the purpose of developing a personal and affective relationship with the Lord.
- It is more important to pray deeply, not read widely. The current reflections of the day would be more than sufficient for anyone who wants to pray deeply and be led into an intimacy with the Lord.
Note: You may share this reflection with someone. However, please note that reflections are not archived online nor will they be available via email request.
Written by His Eminence, Cardinal William SC Goh, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All Rights Reserved
