Fr Ben Garren

Dear Siblings in Christ,

Forgiveness is meant to flow, like water, from where the capacity to forgive is stored to the spaces in our lives together where it is needed. Jesus speaks of the need to forgive seventy-seven times, a number which is not meant as a tally but an expectation to continually forgive. This admonition is not meant to be a burden but a calling to ensure that the fountain of forgiveness flowing from God's love for us moves through our lives to all around us.

In the parable Jesus presents us in today's Lenten reading we see that forgiveness is something given out of the largesse of those who have much to those who are burdened with debt. It is not a burden taken up by those who are in need to provide for those who have much. The harshest punishment is set aside for the person who has the ability to alleviate the pain of others and chooses instead to increase it. The one who stops the flow of forgiveness.

Take a few moments to reflect on where the act of forgiveness is felt as a burden in your life. Meditate on where is there a block in the flow of forgiveness moving through your life. Then go to where forgiveness flows easily in your life and allow that, in even a small way, to lighten the burden and clear the blocks in yourself. Find ways to be part of the flow of God's forgiveness not seven times a day, but seventy-seven times, by opening ourselves to the Love of God offered at the Cross.

Pax,

—Ben