{"id":767,"date":"2015-09-19T12:29:40","date_gmt":"2015-09-19T17:29:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/?p=767"},"modified":"2015-09-22T12:33:01","modified_gmt":"2015-09-22T17:33:01","slug":"dealing-with-enemies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/?p=767","title":{"rendered":"Dealing With Enemies"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thursday of 23rd<\/sup> Week of Ordinary Time<\/h3>\n

Col 3: 12-17; Lk 6: 27-38<\/h3>\n

Dc. Larry Brockman<\/h3>\n

Isn\u2019t it annoying how difficult the people around us are!\u00a0 Like people who cut us off on the highway, or sneak into the parking place we\u2019ve chosen just ahead of us.\u00a0 Then there are the folks who talk in Church on Sunday.\u00a0 And these are just the little things!\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Worse yet is the person who always visits us unannounced right around dinner time; or the guy across the street who constantly plays recordings of a hard rock band at 11 O\u2019clock at night.\u00a0 They could be heard 2 miles away by the deaf with earmuffs on!<\/p>\n

In fact, if each of us is really honest about our relationships in life, we recognize that sometimes we get irritated the easiest by those we are closest to in life.\u00a0 Whether it is- because we expect more out of them; or it happens more often with them, or whatever, but the fact is that \u201cfamiliarity breeds contempt\u201d.<\/p>\n

Now of course, I would never be such an irritation to anyone else.\u00a0 Curious, but my wife looked over my shoulder as I was preparing this homily.\u00a0 You know what she had the nerve to do?\u00a0 She snickered, and said \u201cGet over yourself\u201d.<\/p>\n

Yes, we view ourselves with one standard, but apply a different standard to everyone else.\u00a0 The fact is that God wants all of us to abide by His standard, and it is truly a \u201cstandard\u201d for everyone based on Love, the kind of love that is selfless; the kind of love that recognizes that none of us is perfect; all of us are human and all of us wrongfully think primarily of ourselves on occasion.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s face it: all of us cut other people off in one way or another; all of us play loud music that bothers others- in one way or another; and all of us interrupt other people at an inconvenient time for them once and a while.\u00a0 But do all of us bear with one another\u2019s human faults like this with patience and forgiveness?\u00a0 Indeed we are called to \u201cput on love, that is, the bond of perfection\u201d in all of these cases.<\/p>\n

Most of us get frustrated with ourselves after we lose our cool over the little things,\u00a0 And go away and feel sorry that we did them.\u00a0 And we ask God to forgive us such trespasses.\u00a0 We not only ask, but we expect that God will forgive us.\u00a0 And fortunately, God hears our confession and forgives us.\u00a0 He has told us over and over He would do that because his standard is love and forgiveness.\u00a0 We need to do the same for others.<\/p>\n

And yet forgiving people for their human weaknesses ends up being the easy part.\u00a0 Jesus demands much more of us in the Gospel.\u00a0 Jesus is not just talking about forgiving human weaknesses, but Jesus is talking about being kind, patient, forgiving, and even loving, to our enemies.\u00a0 Yes, even to our enemies.<\/p>\n

Now the interesting thing about the things an enemy does is that they are rooted in the same evil as our human weaknesses- selfishness.\u00a0 That\u2019s why people lie, cheat, steal, kill, and a whole host of other things.\u00a0 Jesus is trying to tell us that we also need to handle these people and their flaws the same way we handle the small stuff- with Love, because that is God\u2019s answer to all sin and selfishness.<\/p>\n

You see, when you come right down to it,\u00a0 God has no choice but to act according to his nature.\u00a0 Life is all about us learning to adopt God\u2019s nature as our own so we can live in harmony with him forever.\u00a0 We have to kill our enemies with love because love is the only way they will truly be converted.\u00a0 By our example, they can and will be converted.<\/p>\n

That doesn\u2019t mean we condone the evil an enemy does or stand by and let it happen.\u00a0 But it means that when we have the opportunity to relate to them, we show them that we are people of love, not of hate.<\/p>\n

So let\u2019s all try it.\u00a0 The next time you have an opportunity to relate to someone you haven\u2019t been getting along with, try something different.\u00a0 Try treating them in as loving a manner as you possibly can.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thursday of 23rd Week of Ordinary Time Col 3: 12-17; Lk 6: 27-38 Dc. Larry Brockman Isn\u2019t it annoying how difficult the people around us are!\u00a0 Like people who cut us off on the highway, or sneak into the parking place we\u2019ve chosen just ahead of us.\u00a0 Then there are the folks who talk in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[368],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=767"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":768,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/767\/revisions\/768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}