As we pray, consider just who our prayers are intended for

For most people our efforts include those we love, then the many whom we know, and finally to the unseen that may pass our tent called home. However there is one more group that may easily pass by for our consideration; those who are enemies of the peace we seek and the multitudes that threaten our very lives.

Listen to the words of our close companions, our family, and the teachers of God’s consideration that Christ came to us through his Incarnation to free us from eternal death. What is essential with his assuming a human body is; For the Son of man has come to seek and save what was lost. (Lk 19: 10).

The most important element of his creating man is the desire to save him from losing his soul and did what no human could ever accomplish by taking his sins and drowning them in the depth of the ocean of forgiveness.

To understand this movement of an eternal God who is beyond any sign of evil infraction is to place ourselves inside the mind of God. Of course, this is not possible and we are at a loss to even have any idea of what this term forgiveness is all about.

In a world that is being taken over by the evil intent of greed, self-satisfaction, and perhaps a quest for domination by unbelievers of a God who even waits for these humans to repent and seek forgiveness is beyond our understanding. But, the one mandate that Jesus brought to our attention is found in the many parables that pointed to that very fact of the readiness of God to overlook our sinfulness and find just one ounce of repentance to receive his mercy.

If we had not fallen like Adam our existence would be life in a garden of peace and God’s generosity. But as we all know the free will and desire of our human selfishness eliminated that probability. When we look at the parable of the Lost Son (the Prodigal) some are insulted that a Father would not wait for his son to reach home after squandering his money and his father’s good name. Instead this loving Father looked day and night for any sign of sorrow from this son and ran to his son who was lost, and was dead and came back to life. That is God who sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to save everyone of us by sharing our humanity and suffering to become the example of complete forgiveness for anyone who falls from sin.

Once we have this scenario implanted in our psyche we shall be on the road to eternal forgiveness and an existence that was the intention of the Trinity to share forever.

We are at a crossroad of choosing to be as God is and forgiving all of the evil minded humans that have nothing but an intention to maim, kill, and steal even our nation and world peace. That is a semblance of what our sin is all about. Yet, God will forgive us, all of us, if we only accept his mercy. We cannot earn his goodness; he just asks us to believe in what Christ did for us by asking his Father; Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.” (Lk 23: 34). This is the mandate we must follow as well.

Ralph B. Hathaway