Readings: Daniel 3: 25,34-43; Psalm 25; Matthew 18:21-35
Peter is often a central figure in the Gospels, but in the Gospel of Matthew has a very high profile. It is only in Matthew that Jesus addresses Peter as the rock on which he will build his church, and, as in the Gospel today, it is only in Matthew that Peter asks the question that was perhaps on the minds of many of the disciples: what do you with a person who keeps sinning against you?“Lord, if a brother or sister sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?”Peter thought he was being generous with his suggestion of seven times. In the Scriptures, seven is a symbol of fullness and completion. To forgive someone seven times would seem about as far as one could possibly go. Yet Jesus said that we should forgive seventy-seven times. In other words, there is to be no limit to our willingness to forgive. This is because God is always ready to forgive us. However, we will be unable to experience the fruits of this forgiveness if we are unable to forgive one another from the heart.
Our human tendency is to place limits on our forgiveness of others (not necessarily on ourselves!). By the parable that Jesus recounts, it would seem that Jesus was well aware of our narrowmindedness to limit so many things, such our patience, our charity, our mercy. A very fortunate person had been generously forgiven a huge debt. But he could not find it in his heart to forgive another a much lesser debt.
This hardness of heart is our unwillingness to forgive one another. There are times when we are reluctant to forgive someone because we feel we are letting them off the hook for hurting us. But in clinging on to that resentment, we are allowing that person to continue to hurt us many times over. Forgiveness allows us to let go of that hurt and to heal.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus calls on Peter – and he calls on us – to be God-like in readiness to forgive. If we only realized how much God forgives us! This is an essential truth. This Lent, may we be able to experience the extent of God’s forgiveness of us because we are willing to forgive each other and ourselves not just seven times but seventy-seven times.