17th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C)
Genesis 18:20-32 | Psalm 137:1-3,6-8 | Colossians 2:12-14 | Luke 11:1-13
God gives us permission all day, every day, to ask Him for what we want out of our own free will. Jesus taught us to ask for daily sustenance and forgiveness commensurate with our own forgiveness towards others.
But Abraham goes one step further: he asks for mercy for the righteous faithful in Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboim and Bela, five cities on the Jordan River plain in southern Canaan. Our spiritual father had no idea if there were any such people worth saving, but he pleaded their case anyway.
Through his pleas, Lot and his family were saved from the fire and brimstone that flattened the plain, but God also spared the entire city of Bela (later called Zoar), not because of their own merit, but so that Lot had a safe place to run to.
We too are called to ask for mercy for others around us, not just for ourselves, and not just for those whom we think are deserving of compassion. Even William Shakespeare was hip to this, as one of his most famous passages clearly states:
PORTIA / BALTHAZAR:
The quality of mercy is not strain’d,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes:
‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God’s
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,
That, in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy. I have spoke thus much
To mitigate the justice of thy plea;
Which if thou follow, this strict court of Venice
Must needs give sentence ‘gainst the merchant there.
(The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene 1)
Heavenly Father, have mercy on us and on all mankind, as we show mercy to those around us. Amen.