JUDGE NOT...

A MESSAGE FOR THE FIRST SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

Today’s great feast of the Most Holy Trinity is always celebrated on the First Sunday after Pentecost.  In a certain sense, this is a pity, as the very significant Gospel of the First Sunday is always relegated to the Last Gospel at today’s Mass.  It’s a warning from God that we must not be hypocrites. Our Lord asks: “Why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in thine own eye?”  We hate to admit it, but we’re all guilty at one time or another of finding fault in others while behaving blatantly in the same way ourselves.

I caught myself doing this just the other day, when I became more than a little annoyed at members of a certain political party, calling them “treasonous” for being so mechanically hostile to the country’s head of state.  And yet, I realized, if the other candidate had won the last presidential election, I would be doing exactly the same thing. Such are the dangers of being over-zealous in our opinions, and so entrenched in our own way of thinking that we give way to a certain lack of tolerance for the views of others.

We should always try to see the good in our neighbor.  Admittedly, these days, that’s an increasingly difficult challenge, as political and yes, religious viewpoints become more and more outrageous and impossible to ignore.  But Christ will ultimately judge us on the spirit with which we view our opponents—a motivation guided by the love of God and love of the truth, rather than hatred and intolerance and anger.  Loving the sinner and hating the sin is a nice way of summing it up, but in practice, a difficult art to master.

Nevertheless, much depends on our ability to overcome our own self-righteousness and hypocrisy.  We must make a serious attempt to follow our Lord’s admonition, “Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven.”  Obviously, our very salvation hangs in the balance here, and we should keep a tight rein on our tendency to see the faults in others and not our own.

There are alwaysmitigating factors in the bad behavior of others.  Even when they seem to have no excuse for their wickedness, let’s look first to the mirror and remember all the awful things wehave done.  Do wehave an excuse?  Often we don’t, and if we are to be forgiven, then by golly, we had better excuse them that trespass against us!  “Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful.”