Peter is pondering a limit or cap on the number of times he needs to forgive someone. He says to Jesus, “If my brother sins against me, how often must I forgive? As many as seven times?” Jesus famously responds, “I say to you, not seven times but seventy-seven times.” Who of us have forgiven others that many times?
Have our African American brothers and sisters forgiven us for our white supremacy seventy-seven times? They have forgiven us for terrorizing and killing them in slavery: human bondage, family separation, brandings, whippings, sex abuse, rape, denial of human rights – life, marriage, family, speech, …. They have forgiven us for terrorizing and killing them through Jim Crow discrimination in business ownership, education, employment, G.I. Bill of Rights, health care, housing, law, New Deal programs, political rights, …. They have forgiveness us for terrorizing and killing them in white race riots throughout the 19th century: Meridian, Colfax, New Orleans, Memphis, Charleston, Wilmington, …; across the 20th century: Red Summer of 1919; Tulsa, Rosewood, Beaumont, Mobile, Detroit, Cicero, Marquette Park, … ; across the beginning of the 21st century: Washington D.C., Charleston; Charlottesville, …. They have forgiven us for continuing to terrorize and kill them in white supremacist groups from the 19th century on: Vigilance Committees, Ku Klux Klan,…; from the 20th century on: American Nazi Party, Aryan Brotherhood, Posse Comitatus, Aryan Nations, The Order/Aryan Resistance, Skinheads, Patriot Movement, Militia Movement, Stormfront,…; from the 21st century on: National Policy Institute, American Freedom Party, Daily Stormer, Atom Waffen Division, Identity Evropa, Proud Boys, and now the Trump Administration,…. Is it at “seventy-seven times” yet?
“The social contract is broken.” “You broke the contract when you killed us in the streets.” “You broke the contract when for 400 years we played your game and built your wealth. You broke the contract again when we built our wealth on our own by our bootstraps in Tulsa and you dropped bombs on us. When we built it in Rosewood and you came in and you slaughtered us. You broke the contract.” “You are lucky that what Black people are looking for is equality and not revenge.” (Kimberley Jones)
Prayer: Spirit of Communion, forgive us our trespasses.
Question: What are the sins I hold against people?
September 13, 2020 Gospel Matthew 18:21-35 Twenty Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time