24th Sunday in Ordinary Time 2026
My friends, there is a subtle, sweet poison that modern man drinks with great relish, mistakenly believing it will harm his enemy. That poison is resentment. We nurse it, we treasure it, we reheat it in the late hours of the night and all the while, it eats away at the container that holds it.
Look at the extraordinary symmetry of the Word of God today. In the Book of Sirach, the sacred writer asks a question that strikes directly at the heart of human hypocrisy: "Does one person harbour anger against another and yet seek for healing from the Lord?" It is a total spiritual contradiction: Man or lady kneeling before God, begging for divine mercy, while holding a dagger of vengeance behind his or her back aimed directly at his brother or sister. Ultimately, Sirach reminds us that to pray ‘forgive us our trespasses, while refusing to forgive others is to ask God not to forgive us, because we write the terms of our own judgment by how we treat those that wronged us.
Then comes the Gospel of Matthew. Peter, ever practical, ever human, ever eager to quantify grace, approaches Jesus and asks: "Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?" Peter thought he was being heroic; and remember, the rabbinic tradition suggested forgiving someone three times was generous. Seven was the number of perfection. But Our Lord shatters that human arithmetic: "I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven."
WHY THE ANSWER FROM JESUS? Because God does not keep a ledger, and the moment a Christian starts keeping score, he abandons the Cross immediately.
Consider the drama of the parable today. A servant owes his king ten thousand talents. For clarity sake, in the ancient world, a single talent was roughly twenty years of a laborer’s wages. Ten thousand talents was an astronomical sum—the GDP of entire provinces, billions in today’s currency. It was an impossible, unpayable debt. The servant falls on his knees, pleading for time, promising to pay. But the king knows he can never pay. Out of pure, unmerited compassion, the king does not grant a payment plan; he wipes the entire debt away.
Now lets analyze the story: That King is Almighty God. That unpayable debt is the cumulative weight of human sin. That servant is you. That servant is me. On the hill of Calvary, Jesus Christ paid a debt He did not owe because he was indebted, No, we owed a debt we could not pay.
Yet, watch what happens next. That same servant steps out of the palace, walking in the light of absolute freedom. He meets a fellow servant who owes him a just hundred denarii, about three months' wages. A real sum, yes, but trivial compared to billions. And what does he do? Does he pass on the mercy he received? No. He grabs his companion by the throat and screams, "Pay what you owe!". This is redicoulous.
but, how often do we act out this exact tragedy? We kneel at the Altar, receive the body and blood of Christ, and beg for divine absolution. Then we walk out the church doors, pull out our emotional ledger, and choke our spouse over a careless comment, refuse to speak to an adult child over a holiday disagreement, or harbor a cold, simmering grudge against a colleague who took credit for our work. We hold people hostage over pennies when God has just canceled our billions.
My Dear Brothers and sisters, forgiveness is not a warm emotion; it is a cold, tough act of the will. It does not mean excusing the wrong, pretending the hurt did not happen, or inviting an abusive person back into your daily life without boundaries. Forgiveness simply means releasing the right to destroy the person who hurt you. It means handing the ledger over to God and saying, "I refuse to let your sin against me control my spiritual destiny." If you refuse to forgive, your heart becomes a prison, and you are the inmate, not the guard. You remain chained to the very person who wounded you.
Let us make this intensely practical today. Before you leave this church, bring to your mind the face of the one person you least want to forgive. The person whose name makes your blood boil.
First, acknowledge the debt. Do not minimize the pain. Name the injustice honestly before God. Second, surrender the right to retaliate. Stop rehearsing the argument in your head. Stop telling the story to others to win allies against them. Third, pray for their good. You do not have to feel affectionate toward them. Pray simply that God gives them the grace of salvation and healing.
You do not wait for the other person to deserve your pardon; you were not deserving when God pardoned you. Let the debt go today. For it is only when we release the throat of our brother that our hands are finally open to receive the infinite mercy of God.
God loves you more than I do