Twenty-seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time • Year C
The biblical psalms have an extensive list of warning signs like “harden not your hearts.” A hardened heart has the same features as the steel plate. The heart, a sign of compassion, can become rigid by our life encounters. The hardened heart at times buries our dark and broken encounters, creating a cold-hearted person!
Seventh Sunday of Easter • Year B
The Seventh Sunday of Easter contains the prayer of hope that Christ proclaims on Good Friday: “Father forgive them, they know not what they are doing.” How do we imitate Christ’s Good Friday prayer? Such a prayer is the pathway to Peace that was given to disillusioned disciples when he breathed on them the gift of mercy. “Receive the Holy Spirit, whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained.” Have we received and implemented the disciples’ gift to forgive, to love one another? Or do we choose to live in the darkness of anger which often migrates to hatred?