When I'm preparing homilies or sermons for the weekend, I very often cheat. Well, that's not the best word for it. What I call it is "I do my homework." You see, over in my bookshelves, I have books with hundreds of homilies by pretty good preachers on all the readings of the three-year cycle of Sundays. And so, what I'll do sometimes is when I know it's a particular gospel I'm going to preach on, I'll look up and see what they said about it and it will kind of kick-start my own thinking.

So, yesterday I took this passage, Luke, Chapter 6, (Forgive. Don't judge. "The Golden Rule") and I looked it up in nine different books, four different preachers, and you know how many homilies I found on this passage by them? Zero!... Zero!.... Not one of them would touch it with an eleven foot pole. And, you know, why is that? Because this passage is familiar. It's common. It's basic to Christianity. I think it's because it's also very, very tough stuff.

You know, it's almost like what G. K. Chesterton, the British author, wrote about Christianity. He said, the problem with Christianity is not that it's been tried and found wanting. It's that it has been found difficult and left not tried at all. And it's a little bit like this, I guess. This is tough, tough stuff. Forgive one another. Love your enemies. Don't judge..... Give me a break! You know, in a world with kidnapping and abuse of innocent children, in a world with corruption among politicians, in a world with incompetence among public leaders, in a world with evil tyrants still around, like Saddam Hussein..... Give me a break!

What do you mean, "Don't judge?" Even Jesus doesn't live up to this. Don't judge. And Jesus goes out and says to the Pharisees, "You hypocrites! Woe to you!" And He starts looking for a four-letter word that He can use in the Bible on them! And He says, "You are like white-washed tombstones." Even Jesus has trouble living up to this! But what Jesus does in this passage, (And it's the tag end of what we call the Sermon of Jesus, Sermon on the Mount, Sermon on the Plain, same one.).... what Jesus does is He brings to a peak and to a climax and to a high point, a long evolution, a long history of development, a long search among believing, godly people for what is the standard for our behavior if we are going to be believers, if we are going to be searchers, if we're going to be religious or spiritual people. What's the standard for our behavior?

And it's a long history. You can find it all in the Bible. You find it in the inspired word of God, where first it's this, and then they say, "No. No. It's not that." Then God says this. Then, "No. No. It's not that." Different levels of what the standard is. The first standard, find this in the Bible, is what they call the "Law of the Talon."..."Law of the Talon." In other words, if someone kills my camel, I should go back and kill ten of his camels. Or, better still, every camel he's got, but not his neighbor's camels. Or, if someone kills a member of your family, you should go back and kill, not just one member of his family, but the whole family and the extended family and the cousins and the best friends. That'll teach 'em. That's the Law of the Talon. And I suppose what recommends it is, first of all, it does let the guy know that what he did was wrong. Secondly, it's limited to just his tribe. Don't go outside his tribe. And thirdly, here's a great word we still use. It's a great "deterrent." We use that for capital punishment. We use if for nuclear arms. Wouldn't that be a great deterrent, the Law of the Talon?

But before long, the Chosen People grow in their understanding of God and of God's will. And they move to something else. The next level I would call the "Law of Even-Steven." The "Law of Even-Steven" says if someone harms you, you repay them but don't overdo it. If he kills my camel, I will go kill one of his, but no more than that. Or, as the Bible puts it, "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." Even-Steven! That sounds pretty fair, right? That sounds pretty good. An eye for an eye.... Except, as Pope John Paul II has said, if we follow the Law of the Eye for an Eye, before long, everybody will be blind. Both of us end up blind if you follow that law.

It's interesting if you listen to the first reading, kind of an adventure story. And I've told you this before: remember, the first reading at every Mass, from the Old Testament, is married to the Gospel. So, if the Gospel is about forgiveness, do good to other people, the Golden Rule, then in the Old Testament, they find something like it, and they marry the two together. Well, they have trouble today, because there "ain't no Golden Rule" in the Old Testament. So, how can they find something to match?

And they get this story of David. And David is living at the time of the Law of the Talon, and, at best, the Law of an Eye for an Eye. And he's at war with King Saul. And what he does is he creeps into his tent at night, past three hundred soldiers, past the bodyguard. He's standing there and Saul is sleeping on the ground with his spear in the ground. And David's buddy says, "I can nail him... I can put a spear into him from here and he'll be dead." And what David says is, "No. Let him go." But he doesn't do it because of the Golden Rule. He says, "...because this is God's king, God's anointed, and we may get punished by God. So we better clear out of here. So, tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to steal that spear, and we're going to go to the mountain on the other side and we're going to wave at those three thousand when they get up in the morning and say, 'How do you like them apples?... We got your king's spear. We're better than you.'" That's how that story goes.

But, after David, the Scripture moves on to another level, another standard, not the Golden Rule, but the Silver Rule. The Silver Rule, which we find in Scripture, and the Silver Rule which we find in great Jewish Rabbis, in Greek Philosophers, and even in Eastern Mystics. For example, a student goes to the great Jewish rabbi, Hillel, and says, "Can you teach me the whole law while I am standing on one foot?" Doesn't give you much time? Right? And Hillel says, "Yes I can." He says, "What is hateful to you, do not do to another." That's the whole law... What is hateful to you, do not do to another. That's the whole law. All the rest is explanation. Meanwhile, in the Far East, a student goes to Confucius and he says, "Is there one word that can serve as a standard of practice for my whole life?" And Confucius says, "Yes. There is. The word is 'reciprocity.' What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to anyone else." Do not do harm. That's the Silver Rule. Not bad.... Not bad.

But Jesus comes along. And He looks at the Law of the Talon. And He says, "Forget it. That's wrong." And Jesus comes along and He looks at the Law of an Eye for an Eye and a Tooth for a Tooth, and He says, "Forget it. That's wrong." And then He looks at the Silver Rule (Do not do harm.) and He says, "That's not good enough.... That's not good enough." For followers of Christ, who understand the kind of God that Jesus tells us about, it's not enough to do no harm, to do nothing, to stand there and do nothing. We have to be a people who change the world, who do good everywhere we can.

There's an interesting Buddhist story about a warrior prince who loves God, but his job in life is going to war and killing people. And he feels that's wrong. So he prays and prays, and the God Vishnu appears to him and Vishnu says, "Listen. This is the way the world is. Love God and do your job."

Jesus says just the opposite. "If you love God, change the human situation. Improve everything for everyone around you. Don't just stand there. Do something." So, whereas the Silver Rule is negative (Don't harm.) the Golden Rule is positive. (Do something.) And Jesus takes it a step further and says, "Don't just be ordinary about it. Go above and beyond your natural instincts. Go above and beyond your normal inclinations. Go above and beyond the ordinary expectations." I mean, if you love those who love you, what's the big deal? If you're good to those who are good to you, what's the big deal? Jesus says, "Go beyond that." Why?.... Why?

He also says why. Why would we go beyond that? Why do we want to do good to everyone? We go beyond that because of our belief in God, of what God is like. Our God is generous in compassion, boundless in forgiveness, unconditional in love. And Jesus says, "Don't follow your natural tendencies. Follow your God." That's what we are called to do.

Interesting passage at the very end, all that stuff being poured into your lap.... Did you get that part? If you keep the Golden Rule, all that stuff will be poured into your lap. Sounds messy to me. Well, you know, at the time of Jesus people dressed a little bit the way I'm dressed today. (Wait a minute. You'll see what he has on under his kilt!) And they had a belt around their robe. And if they were going a little distance, it had more than they could handle with their hands. They'd pull the robe up over the belt, hold it out like this, fold stuff into it and carry it. That's how they carried things. So what Jesus is saying is you keep the Golden Rule and your pockets will get filled. Your pockets will be filled. That sounds great. That's good news to people like ourselves, Christian consumers.... and to Christian capitalists.... and to Christian economy watchers. That's good news... except our God is not an ATM machine. Rather what Jesus says is "Follow My teaching and My wisdom and that will fill our days with meaning and it will fill our hearts with peace and it will fill our hopes and our future with life that really lasts." Amen.