Week 12 Monday (Year 2)

Readings: 2 Kings 17.5-8, 13-15a, 18; Psalm 59/60; Matthew 7.1-5

The image of a person with a plank in his eye is one of the most absurd in the Gospels. It is not the only place where Jesus uses surreal and exaggerated comparisons to make a point. the point here is to warn us about the ways in which our judgement of others is inevitably distorted.

So better to hold back altogether from judging others. Of course there are situations where we are obliged to discern, decide and execute judgement about things and people. The virtue of prudence is concerned with those. But it is a different kind of judgement to the one intended here.

Here the judgement involved is about the fundamental goodness or otherwise of another person, about the motivations of their behaviour, about their intentions in doing what they do. Best to leave that kind of judgement to God while ourselves seeking to be kind and merciful always towards others, as we want God to be kind and merciful towards ourselves.

That petition of the Our Father is a risky one, therefore, the one by which we ask that the Lord might forgive us as we forgive others. There's the rub, and the first thing to think about: how do I forgive others? do I forgive them?

God allows us to set the criterion: 'what you measure out is what you will be given'. If we do not understand forgiveness in relation to others neither will we appreciate the great gift it is when we ourselves receive God's mercy. It will be a foreign language to us, beyond our ken, as if we had a plank in our eyes.