Reflection on Mt 5:44

But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you.

Jesus tells us what our relationship should be to our enemies:

1) we are to love them;

2) to bless those who curse us;

3) to do good to those who hate us;

4) to pray for those who spitefully use us and persecute us.

Each of these four requirements may seem absurd at first glance and give the impression that by fulfilling them we open the door for evil to spread through evil people. The world has different standards, which are contrary to Christ’s requirements:

1) Instead of love for enemies, it automatically stirs up hatred or enmity.

2) Instead of blessing those who curse, it wishes at best that the curse they call down falls on their heads.

3) Instead of doing good to those who hate, it returns evil for evil and feels malicious joy when they suffer harm.

4) Instead of praying for those who spitefully use and persecute us, its prayer is perhaps one springing from self-pity, so that the enemies realize the wrong they are doing and make amends.

This is the attitude of most people, and this is also the attitude of average Christians, who take the foolishness of the Gospel with great reserve and do not apply it in their lives at all. When hearing the words of Christ which are contrary to experience and reason, a naturally minded person wants to hear an adequate justification for why he should treat his enemies in this way. Without proper understanding, these words will have no impact on his Christian life.

To start with, we need to become aware of some basic realities. We are tainted with original sin, just like our enemies and every human being. Original sin clouds our mind and puts our untouchable ego at the centre of everything. That is also why we do not want to hear the objective truth about ourselves and if anyone tells us we hate them. This poisoned source of evil, original sin, is in us, all the people, and at its root it is connected to the spirit of lies and death, which is the old serpent, the devil. It is the spirit of pride which tempts man to proudly worship himself, resist God, ignore God’s love, and become like the devil. God does good to us, but the devil, a liar and a thief, takes the credit for it pretending that it is him who helps us. This is also the reason for the current massive spread of the global ideology of hidden Satanism. Its fruit is the mass killing of unborn children and the planned so-called depopulation to a “golden” billion. One of the means to achieve this is also the idiocy of homosexualism and transsexualism, and the removal of natural law that has always guaranteed at least minimal justice in relations between people or nations. All this happens under the influence of the spirit of lies and the people who open themselves to its systematic deception, and the lies create an image of truth. What they do is they conceal the essence of truth, blow up whatever unimportant thing, and stir up emotions. People then hate each other, because everyone concentrates on their own part of the truth, and the result is tension in families, divorce, quarrels, hatred, and mass suicide of humanity at large. This is the fruit of the spirit of lies and of the source of evil, or original sin in us. We humans have a material body and an immaterial soul that manifests itself through reason and free will. However, the soul of man is deeply wounded by sin. It manifests itself in the human body through diseases, and finally death. To truly know the essence of truth, we need God’s light. Without it, we will not be able to understand it and will only remain with a partial truth – our truth, which is not objective and cannot save us. Jesus is the Truth. Those who have intimate communion with Him recognize the deep essence of truth, which brings harmony among people already here on earth, enables the correct discernment between good and evil, and gives an assurance of eternal life.

In brief, the truth in its essence is understood by holy people. Lukewarm Christians only know part of the truth. To grow in holiness, we must take the steps of faith that Jesus leads us to. If we start taking them, we will naturally get a deeper knowledge of God. This knowledge is associated with overcoming our human pride by obeying the Word of God. And the Word of God also includes this commandment, which requires four attitudes of faith. We have also expressed the attitudes of natural, human logic, which view our relationship to the enemy only from the perspective of time and in which there is no place for a view from the perspective of eternity.

Why should I love my enemies? Because they are also God’s creation. They, like me, have the root of evil in them and are deceived by the same old self – the ego in us – just as I am deceived by it. Furthermore, I should love them because Jesus shed His blood on the cross for them too. They have an immortal soul and after death they will either be eternally damned or eternally saved. They do not realize it, they do not have the light of truth, and even if I evangelize them, they will consider me a fanatic and an intruder who interferes in their private lives. They regard my saving faith as foolishness, or even as something dangerous. I am powerless to tell them the truth to save them. Why? Because the old self, i.e. the human ego, has a defence system against the truth, which I recognize in myself too. It manifests itself in specific crisis situations. Otherwise, I think everything is fine, but it is not. I am to love my neighbour as myself. In other words, I do not want my neighbour to end up in eternal suffering in hell. And the same applies to my enemy. Even my closest fellow brother, that is, a Christian, can be my enemy. The attitude of love is that I forgive him for hurting me. By doing evil, he also hurts the Lord Jesus. But the same is true about me: I also hurt the Lord Jesus with my indifference, my lukewarm Christian life. How many of us do not take Jesus seriously in our everyday lives, do not find time for prayer, are slaves to the smartphone, the Internet, public opinion. We are often deceived just like the people of the world, but we do not admit it. By adopting an attitude of love towards my enemy, that means that I forgive him for hurting me, and moreover I thank God for allowing him to hurt me since that pain leads me to God, I will get a deeper knowledge of God’s love and also obtain true love for myself as well as for my enemy.

Next, Jesus asks: Bless those who curse you. The Holy Scriptures say that seven times a day we are to praise God for His righteous judgments, even though from my perspective I see that the enemy who is cursing me is in darkness. For example, it annoys him that I do the will of God, or he cannot bear that my life contradicts his view of life or human relationships. For some people, cursing can be the result of anger when they learn that others have exalted themselves over them or slandered them in front of another person, and this person then tells them about it with “juicy” comments. The reason for cursing is often not even known, but the tension and malice on the part of my enemy should somehow stop me in my life. I should fall on my knees and ask God with a sincere heart for light on this situation. I must know that God allows this suffering for my good. He wants me to act in faith, that is, to bless my enemy, so that God will give him health and protect him from evil. Whatever I wish for him, God will surely give to me too. Many times because of my blessing the enemy gets the light and realizes the deception he has succumbed to. He is then able to unmask the spirit that led him by the nose and kept him in darkness or false light, which was the incentive for his cursing. However, if we want to solve the situation only logically, i.e. by apologizing to the enemy, it may end badly. He may turn it against us: he will claim that the apology is proof of our guilt and accuse us of trying to manipulate him. On the other hand, there are cases where we can humble ourselves before the enemy, and this will be another step to victory over the spirit of lies and pride and over the ego of the old self. But we must do so only when commissioned by God and only when we ourselves first fulfil these four requirements of Jesus. One of them is that I should bless my enemy and thank God for this suffering. This suffering is also a manifestation of God’s love, in that I can suffer purgatory here on earth and be spared the torment of eternity. Although the torment in purgatory is temporary, it is very painful.

Do good to those who hate you. We should try to do them good by secret acts of faith. We can praise in front of other people some of the good points of the person who has shown hatred towards us. People are usually very quick to tell my enemy what I have said about him, and this affects him as well, because it is an expression of obedience of faith to the commandment of God, specifically this commandment of Jesus.

Let us be thankful that our enemies force us to pray. Otherwise, we think that we do not have time to pray, or we are distracted and only recite some words that do not touch our heart at all. But the problem with our enemy does touch our heart. An example of praying for our enemies is Jesus Himself. When enemies were driving nails into His hands, He said: “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.” His prayer is an example for us to follow.

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