6th September 2020. 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time Mt 18, 15-20
How easy it is for us to judge any behaviour of others, and when we do so we are placing ourselves as if in a superior situation, above them, with reason and truth on our side. I almost dare to say that, if we judge, we immediately condemn, even if we don’t express it, but we feel it.
In Jesus’ time and in the first Christian groups, something like this was bound to happen, so that Jesus would clearly indicate to us what the position of the disciple should be: “if your brother sins, rebuke him alone. Call on him to acknowledge his fault. But from humility, from love of the brother. Trying to win over the brother, without holding anything against him, without feeling superior. It is the only way to be a “brother”, to create community. If Jesus tells us to carry out fraternal correction it is because, in some way, he considers us responsible for others. It is not enough for a Christian to think that he should not meddle where he is not invited, or not want to complicate his life, which is much more comfortable. We cannot ” pass over ” others. We owe them a “debt of love,” St. Paul tells us. It is with them that we can and must pray in order to make Jesus present in us.
Juan Ramón Gómez Pascual, cmf
