Franciscan Friar Fr. Paul Gallagher reflects on the Gospel readings for the Seventh Sunday of Ordinary Time. Can you envision Jesus speaking to the mixed crowd of apostles, disciples, and the crowd of people who have gathered? Who might have been among that crowd? Why do you think they might have come?
The content is edited by Franciscan Sister of Christian Charity Sister Anne Marie Lom and Joe Thiel. The excerpts from the Sunday readings are prepared by Joe Thiel. To read or download the complete pdf with excerpts for your prayer, please click here: Franciscan Gospel Reflection February 23 2025. Excerpts are from the Lectionary for Mass for Use in the Dioceses of the United States of America, second typical edition © 2001, 1998, 1997, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc., Washington, DC. Used with permission. All rights reserved. No portion of this text may be reproduced by any means without permission in writing from the copyright owner. Photo: St. Andrew Church, Rozellville, Wisconsin, Diocese of La Crosse
Luke 6:27-38
Jesus said to his disciples: “To you who hear I say, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. To the person who strikes you on one cheek, offer the other one as well, and from the person who takes your cloak, do not withhold even your tunic. Give to everyone who asks of you, and from the one who takes what is yours do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you.
For if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do the same. If you lend money to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, and get back the same amount. But rather, love your enemies and do good to them, and lend expecting nothing back; then your reward will be great and you will be children of the Most High, for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.
“Stop judging and you will not be judged. Stop condemning and you will not be condemned. Forgive and you will be forgiven. Give and gifts will be given to you; a good measure, packed together, shaken down, and overflowing, will be poured into your lap. For the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you.”
Background:
In last week’s Gospel Jesus inverted the expected ways of looking at the world. The text described Jesus’ first teaching to the newly named twelve apostles. With the disciples and the crowd present, Jesus addressed the twelve as to what they could expect. “Blessed are you when people hate you, and when they exclude and insult you, and denounce your name as evil on account of the Son of Man… Woe to you when all speak well of you for their ancestors treated the false prophets in this way.” (Luke 6:23, 26)
In this week’s Gospel Jesus continues his instruction with the same starkness that characterized last week’s text. Jesus’ expectations for his disciples draw on their sacred traditions:
“If you lend money to one of your poor neighbors among my people, you shall not act like an extortioner toward him by demanding interest from him. If you take your neighbor’s cloak as a pledge, you shall return it to him before sunset; for this cloak is the only covering he has for his body. What else has he to sleep in? If he cries out to me, I will hear him; for I am compassionate.” (Exodus 22:24-26)
“Do not exact interest from your countryman either in money or in kind, but out of fear of God let him live with you. You are to lend him neither money for interest nor food at a profit.” Leviticus 25:36-37)
Jesus’ expects his disciples to love and live with others as he understands God’s love and compassion. While their tradition calls for a sacrificial relationship for one’s countryman, Jesus extends that to others because God loves. This is radically different from the Pharisees, who believed the path to holiness was found in separating themselves from those deemed unclean in order to maintain ritual purity.
Jesus says it four different ways in the first two verses of this reading, the apostles are to push their traditional boundaries: love (verse 27), do good to (verse 27), bless (verse 28), and pray for (verse 28). The disciples are not to react to the way they are being treated with any sense of the retaliation that was normative at the time. Jesus is asking them to move beyond a neutral non-response to harsh treatment, to positively doing good, blessing, and praying for one’s enemies. He is asking them to treat others as God does, who sends the sun to shine on the good and the bad. “But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, for he makes his sun rise on the bad and the good, and causes rain to fall on the just and the unjust (Matthew 5:44-45).” If being like God is not sufficient enough to motivate them, they are reminded in the last two verses that the way they treat others is the way they can expect God will treat them.
Reflection Questions:
- Can you envision Jesus speaking to the mixed crowd of apostles, disciples, and the crowd of people who have gathered? Who might have been among that crowd? Why do you think they might have come?
- Imagine yourself among this gathering. Where do you imagine yourself? Are there some that you are trying to get next to and others that you would like to avoid?
- As Jesus’ teaching unfolds, are there some who grumble or shake their heads? Are there also some who seem to brighten as he speaks?
- What are you feeling, and what are you thinking, as Jesus speaks?
- What do you find most comforting about Jesus’ teaching this day?
- What do you find most troubling?
- Are there people in your community who seem to have embraced Jesus’ teaching by how they live their lives? What is your attitude toward them?
- Can you take some time to talk honestly about your own experience of loving those who are difficult to love, your desire to know that you have been forgiven by God, or some other issue that arose within you from this text?
