Father, Forgive Them | EXPLAINED | 1st Word from the Cross

Some reflection…

Our Blessed Lord used the word “forgive” because He was the innocent God-man who knew all the secrets of every human heart. Therefore, He could find an excuse: “They know not what they do.”

“Forgive whom? Forgive enemies? The soldier in the courtroom of Caiaphas who struck Him with a mailed fist; Pilate, the politician, who condemned a God to retain the friendship of Caesar; Herod, who robed Wisdom in the garment of a fool; the soldiers who swung the King of Kings on a tree between heaven and earth—forgive them? Forgive them, why? Because they know what they do? No, because they know not what they do. If they knew what they were doing and still went on doing it; if they knew what a terrible crime they were committing by sentencing Life to death; if they knew what a perversion of justice it was to choose Barabbas to Christ; if they knew what cruelty it was to take the feet that trod everlasting hills and pinion them to the limb of a tree; if they knew what they were doing and still went on doing it, unmindful of the fact that the very blood that they shed was capable of redeeming them, they would never be saved! Why, they would be damned if it were not for the fact that they were ignorant of the terrible thing they did when they crucified Christ! It was only the ignorance of their great sin that brought them within the pale of the hearing of that cry from the Cross. It is not wisdom that saves; it is ignorance!” (Fulton Sheen)

Have you learnt this lesson?

St. Peter did. In his first sermon, he used ignorance as an excuse for the Crucifixion: “The author of life you killed . . . and now, brethren, I know that you did it through ignorance, as did also your rulers” (Acts 3:15, 17).

Whereas Jesus knows our hearts from the inside and because He does, He can forgive, we know nothing about the inside of our neighbour’s heart (and so little of the circumstances of their acts and the good faith mingled with their evil deeds), and we often refuse to forgive. What a terrible paradox!

Questions for Reflection

Is there anyone you need to forgive right now?

Do you withhold forgiveness because you think they knew what they were doing?

Is there anyone you need to cry out to our heavenly Father, “Father, forgive them! For they know not what they do”?