Backbiting Tongue
On Friday night, my family prayed the Rosary at home, as we couldn’t make it for the Stations of the Cross and Mass earlier in the evening. As we announced the 2nd Sorrowful Mystery, we read the prescribed meditation for the decade in the Rosary booklet. It hit me like a ton of bricks! I reproduce it here:
“Jesus was condemned to be crucified to death because the people were jealous of Him. They could not see the good in Him. Do I allow fear, power, envy and hatred to blind me from seeing good in others?”
Just the day before, I had been in a discussion with my boss about some colleagues who had a bad impression of me. That naturally got me riled up and I vented my frustration about how bad they too were in other areas. Did I redeem myself by putting others down? I doubt it - it may been a picture of a sore loser, who pulls everyone else into the pit. I admit that I’m guilty of this sin very,very often.
The lesson from today’s Gospel reading about the woman caught in adultery, is also about looking at others faults instead of looking for their goodness. It’s easy to picture us as those holding the stones ready to condemn others. Monsignor Dennis Clark’s interpretation of the mind of Jesus at that moment is stunning. Jesus only sees the face of the Father is each person although it is covered with junk.
What a challenge it is to try to pick the Father’s face in people who we are sure are bad people. Yet there are people who claim that being a Christian is escaping reality. In fact true escapism is when we avoid people we don’t like instead of trying to search for the Father’s face and mend relationships with them.
Wonderful exercise in self-restraint this Lent, if we can think twice before we retort in an uncharitable way towards others in “self-defense”. This little book the Sins of the Tongue - The Backbiting Tongue will be helpful.
