Luke 6: 36-38

Now that my father and mother are not around anymore, every now and then I will look back and reminisce on our years of growing up. Our parents, despite limited financial resources, tried to give us the best in life. This was especially the case with education. Further, for a family of five boys, one could just imagine the problems we brought home to the family.

How were we able to manage all these years up to this point?

Mabait ang diyos (God is Good)

My dear friends, this is the message of St. Luke’s Gospel today. We have all received God’s mercy in life and the challenge is to be merciful to others as well.

Three ways how we can show mercy to others:

1. Pray for others. We all know the power of prayer. We also remember how Jesus healed a paralytic because of the faith of his friends. I recall that whenever my mother got sick, just one posting on FB and you instantly have a prayer brigade.
   
2. Sharing of Time, Talent and Treasure. Yes, we live in difficult times. Yet, this is the challenge: we can think of ourselves first or we can think of our neighbor first. Look at the promise of God to those who know how to share – it will all come back.
   
3. Forgiveness. Nowadays, there is just so much anger and hatred. The law now is “An eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth.” We don’t see the people around us as our brothers and sisters. Hence, the death penalty is okay, extrajudicial killing is okay, gossip and character assassination is okay. Still, the way to go is forgiveness.

Let us remember the very old saying, “What goes around, comes around.” It is all up to us what kind of a country, a society, and a family we would like to have. Is it one that lives in the rule “Lex Taliones” – an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth? Or the one the Jesus suggested – “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”