Infinite Love

Gospel: Matthew 5: 43-48

Here is a commandment of Jesus no one tries to fulfill: love your enemies.  We make all sorts of excuses as to why we cannot love an enemy.  We would rather break up families than attempt to keep this commandment.  We would rather be apart from one another rather than share a meal around the table.  All sorts of noble reasons are offered from the political to the theological differences.  Yet they all fail to follow the command of the Lord.

Consider the table of the Lord.  We find any and every reason to exclude someone from the Lord's table.  And yet consider the Lord at table while on earth. He ate with all of his enemies.  He dined with tax collectors and prostitutes.  He ate with the Pharisees and lawyers who opposed him.  He ate with the one who betrayed him, the one who denied him thrice, and the ones who abandoned him.  Yet, we somehow find a way to not share the Lord's table, let alone our own, with so many people.

How easy we find it to start wars, to execute someone, or to deport another person.  None of these things did the Lord command us to do.  None of these things Jesus ever did while on earth.  Yet those who claim his mantle somehow find it easier to do these things rather than follow the command of the Lord and love our enemies.  Today is a day for us to repent, to find concrete ways of loving our enemies small and great, to fulfill the Lord's command and example.