20160609 OVERCOMING DESTRUCTIVE ANGER
Readings at Mass
Liturgical
Colour: Green.
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First reading
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1 Kings 18:41-46
©
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Elijah said to Ahab,
‘Go back, eat and drink; for I hear the sound of rain.’ While Ahab went back to
eat and drink, Elijah climbed to the top of Carmel and bowed down to the earth,
putting his face between his knees. ‘Now go up,’ he told his servant ‘and look
out to the sea.’ He went up and looked. ‘There is nothing at all’ he said. ‘Go
back seven times’ Elijah said. The seventh time, the servant said, ‘Now there
is a cloud, small as a man’s hand, rising from the sea.’ Elijah said, ‘Go and
say to Ahab, “Harness the chariot and go down before the rain stops you.”’ And
with that the sky grew dark with cloud and storm, and rain fell in torrents.
Ahab mounted his chariot and made for Jezreel. The hand of the Lord was on
Elijah, and tucking up his cloak he ran in front of Ahab as far as the
outskirts of Jezreel.
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Responsorial
Psalm
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Psalm 64:10-13 ©
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To you our praise
is due in Zion, O God.
You care for the
earth, give it water,
you fill
it with riches.
Your river in heaven
brims over
to
provide its grain.
To you our praise
is due in Zion, O God.
And thus you provide
for the earth;
you
drench its furrows;
you level it, soften
it with showers;
you bless
its growth.
To you our praise
is due in Zion, O God.
You crown the year
with your goodness.
Abundance
flows in your steps,
in the
pastures of the wilderness it flows.
The hills
are girded with joy.
To you our praise
is due in Zion, O God.
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Gospel
Acclamation
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cf.1Th2:13
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Alleluia, alleluia!
Accept God’s message
for what it really is:
God’s message, and
not some human thinking.
Alleluia!
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Or
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Jn13:34
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Alleluia, alleluia!
I give you a new
commandment:
love one another just
as I have loved you,
says the Lord.
Alleluia!
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Gospel
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Matthew 5:20-26 ©
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Jesus said to his
disciples, If your virtue goes no deeper than that of the scribes and
Pharisees, you will never get into the kingdom of heaven.
‘You
have learnt how it was said to our ancestors: You must not kill; and if
anyone does kill he must answer for it before the court. But I say this to you:
anyone who is angry with his brother will answer for it before the court; if a
man calls his brother “Fool” he will answer for it before the Sanhedrin; and if
a man calls him “Renegade” he will answer for it in hell fire. So then, if you
are bringing your offering to the altar and there remember that your brother
has something against you, leave your offering there before the altar, go and
be reconciled with your brother first, and then come back and present your
offering. Come to terms with your opponent in good time while you are still on
the way to the court with him, or he may hand you over to the judge and the
judge to the officer, and you will be thrown into prison. I tell you solemnly,
you will not get out till you have paid the last penny.’
OVERCOMING
DESTRUCTIVE ANGER
SCRIPTURE
READINGS: [ 1 KINGS
18:41-46; PS 64:10-13; MATT 5:20-26 ]
Anger is one of the capital
sins. But there are different kinds of anger. If the anger stems
from a certain temperament a person is born with, that anger is not always
destructive, at least not against himself. For such people, because
their anger is more an outburst, they are quickly forgotten and nothing is
taken to heart. Of course, the danger is that those who do not know them
would feel offended and nurse an anger that is smoldering, resentful and even
vindictive. The capital sin of anger refers to this kind of anger;
one that embellishes, seeks, and plots retaliation.
Regardless,
anger makes no one happy. When we are angry, we make others miserable and we
unsettle ourselves. We might appear to be have greater power over
the other person, yet, we know that once we lose our cool, we have been
defeated by our enemies. A person who has self-control will not allow
persons and circumstances to upset or irritate him. Indeed, anyone
who can control us is greater than us. So when we get angry, it means that
our enemy has a hold over us; and he can easily make us lose our peace and joy.
Conversely, when we are
hurt by another’s anger, we become angry as well. So this becomes a
vicious cycle. Anger begets anger. That is why Jesus warns us
that anger will not help the situation to become better. When we
begin to call a person, “fool”, the other person will retaliate and then we
will use even harsher words, like calling him, “renegade”, that is, a
traitor. We know that when harsh and uncharitable words are used, it
often leads to violence, destruction and even killing. Anger can consume
us and when a person is taken over by his anger, he is not himself
anymore. It is as if the devil has possessed him.
So anger in whatever form
and degree will not help us to enter the Kingdom of heaven. This is
because the Kingdom of God is under the rule of God, the rule of love,
compassion and forgiveness. The kingdom of God is the reign of joy and
peace and self-control. So, one cannot expect to be joyful and
happy or be at peace when he is angry. This explains why all those who
cannot forgive, bear and harbor resentment in their hearts, often cannot be
successful and fruitful in life. They create enemies wherever they
go. They cause division wherever they are placed. They cause pain
and trouble, not just in the office but in their homes. This is because
they are not at peace within themselves and thus cannot give peace to
others. Thus, if we are serious about entering the Kingdom of God,
Jesus tells us to go beyond seeking for human justice, that is, an eye for an
eye. As Mathama Ghandi says, the whole world will go blind.
Rather,
Jesus is asking us to seek divine justice, which is mercy and forgiveness.
Only mercy and forgiveness can heal the wounds of division among
men. The vicious cycle of anger and retaliation will only escalate to
violence and killing. No healing can ever take place when we take revenge
on our enemies. This is because our enemies will seek revenge one
day. So we all will continue to live in fear and suspicion. Hence,
it does not serve anyone’s interests to continue with a heart of anger and
resentment. Rendering mercy and forgiveness for many is difficult
because we cannot feel with the one who hurt us. We are judgmental only because
we do not know the person well enough to understand why he is hurt. How
hurt a person is, is not dependent on the event itself but on his experiences
in life since his childhood days. Every reaction and every judgment we make
today is not based on this one event but the accumulation of our past
experiences. Our perceptions of situations and people; our emotions and
feelings are very much influenced by our positive or negative experiences of
life.
Thus if
we really know the struggles and the tensions of our errant brothers and
sisters, we will not judge them. We make judgment only on those people we
do not know. Judgment of the world is based on the externals of an
event or, as it is called, facts. It does not take into consideration the
offender’s past, his previous wounds, his upbringing, the traumas he had gone
through, the abuses that he suffered, the tragedies in his life that have made
him a bitter, revengeful, insecure, selfish and self-centered person.
This explains why Jesus constantly reminds us not to judge because in judging
others, we judge ourselves since it shows how blind we are to the person who is
also hurting even as he hurts us. It shows our lack of compassion,
understanding and self-righteousness (cf Jms and Mt 6). For the same
reason too, we will always be on the side of our loved ones even when they are
wrong, not because we agree with or condone the evil or wrong action but
because we understand why they did certain things. Compassion means
feeling with them. Feeling with is not a matter of right or wrong but
being one with them in their suffering, fear and pain.
Accordingly, the way of
forgiveness begins with the process of dialogue. “So then, if you are
bringing your offering to the altar and there remember that your brother has
something against you, leave your offering there before the altar, go and be
reconciled with your brother first, and then come back and present your
offering.” This instruction of Jesus is not too difficult to
understand. If we are not at peace with our brothers and sisters, how can
we be at peace with God? What do we say to God who is the Father of us
all? Every father is sad to see his children divided. So
until we have made peace with our brothers, the offering we make will merely be
an external offering without meaning. Indeed, what is the use of
going to Church when we do not forgive our brothers? The sacrifice
of reconciliation that Jesus offered on the cross has in truth not achieved its
purpose among us. The peace we offer is a superficial peace because there
is no real peace in our hearts. In fact, it is pure hypocrisy to
offer the sacrifice with Christ to the Father without a willingness to offer
the sacrifice of forgiveness for those who have sinned against us. It will not
give us the peace we pray for. So, Jesus is uncompromising with respect
to reconciling with our brothers before we offer Him worship.
Of
course, there are many of us who truly want to forgive those who have hurt us
deeply, but are presently not able to let go of the hurt. This is a
different matter because the disposition is one of willingness, unlike a
hardened person who has already decided not to forgive. If that
were the case, then the sacrifice of the mass can help the person to be released
of his or her anger as he or she contemplates on the innocent suffering of
Christ’s death on the cross. When we realize that our sins have nailed
Jesus to the cross since He came to die for us and to show us the Father’s
mercy and love, then we too will find the same strength to transform our pain
to redemptive suffering. Together with Jesus, we will suffer innocently
and unjustly out of love and compassion for our enemies in the hope that love
will overcome hatred, forgiveness will heal hearts. So long
as there is this basic disposition to forgive and let go, the Lord will give us
that grace to be released from our hurts.
How, then, should the
process of reconciliation take place? How should dialogue be conducted?
Jesus says, “Come to terms with our opponent in good time while you are
still on the way to the court with him, or he may hand you over to the judge
and the judge to the officer, and you will be thrown into prison.”
Firstly, dialogue should begin “in good time.” In other words, before
things get worse, we should try to reconcile with our enemy. The longer
we wait, the more the resentment deepens. That is why when there is a
misunderstanding, we should allow each other to articulate his or her pain and
anger. This is a necessary part of the healing process. The failure to
begin the dialogue in good time is the cause of many years of anger that
develops into hatred.
Secondly, when we fail to
act, it will develop into a situation that would become almost unmanageable.
Indeed, quite often a quarrel or misunderstanding starts from a small matter,
but because this was never dealt with, such petty quarrels and hurts
accumulate. When another misunderstanding happens, people are too hurt and
wounded that their past prejudices prevent them from listening and feeling with
each other. As a result, there is no openness in dialogue because of
fear, anger and suspicion. What happens then would be the desire to take
revenge rather than be reconciled. As Jesus rightly says, “he may hand
you over to the judge and the judge to the officer, and you will be thrown into
prison.” Indeed, when dialogue fails, the only intention of those
who seek “justice” is not to make things right but simply to take revenge.
Finally, as the first
reading tells us, let us believe in the power of prayer. The ability to
forgive is dependent on prayer. Those who cannot forgive are those who
have not prayed because if they had prayed, they would never have denied others
what they asked from God. How could we ask God to bless us and yet cause
His other sons and daughters to suffer? How could we ask God for
forgiveness for our sins if we are not willing to forgive those who have hurt
us? Without prayer, forgiveness is not possible because it is
divine. So with faith and confidence in God, like Elijah, we need to
pray, not once but seven times, till God sends us the grace of forgiveness and
reconciliation. For this reason, Jesus again and again asks us to pray
for our enemies. This command to pray for our enemies and to bless them
is not an option for us as Christians but a duty. St Paul’s letter to the
Romans and the letter of St Peter underscores that Christians are bound to
forgive all those who have hurt them, following Jesus who too suffered unjustly
and innocently on the cross. Harbouring hatred for our enemies and,
worse, taking revenge, is contrary to our claim that we love God because no
Father is happy when his children are divided.
Written
by The Most Rev William Goh Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All Rights
Reserved
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