Transcript of the Video Above

Daily reflections for Lenten Easter, written by Oblate Father Ron Rolheiser, OMI.

Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do. Jesus said this of his executioners, but is it true? A lot indicates that they were far from innocent. How could Jesus executioners not know what they were doing?
The people who crucified Jesus didn’t know what they were doing because they didn’t know how much they were loved. That is the blindness and the real ignorance of the executioners.

Far too often we crucify others and ourselves because of ignorance, because we feel unloved. For this reason, we’re harsh in our judgments of others and unaware of why we ourselves are prone to weakness and to compromise our dignity. We’re judgmental and weak because at the end of the day, we don’t know any better.

The type of ignorance that allowed sincere people to crucify Jesus can also explain why so many good, sincere people today are are massively blind, communally and individually, to the economic and social demands made by our faith.The real reason we can live so comfortably as the gap between the rich and the poor widens is because we don’t know how much we’re loved by God, not because we’re bad and without conscience.

We feel unloved. And so we feel we have to take life for ourselves. Small wonder we settle for second best, or for almost anything else that promises to fill an aching void inside us. Jesus no doubt is looking at us and saying, forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.

Too few of us at any personal level, have ever heard God say to us, I love you. Too few of us have ever felt what Jesus must have felt when at his baptism, he heard his Father say, you are my beloved child. In you I take delight. Indeed, most of us have never heard another human being saying this to us, let alone God.

There is a place inside us, a place we are rarely aware of, where each and every one of us is being touched and held unconditionally in love by God. Jesus’ executioners acted in a darkness that came from never having had that experience.