8th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year C) - 2 March 2025
2nd March 2025
“Turn your eyes back upon yourself, and you will not judge the doings of others.” - St Thérèse of Lisieux
A reflection on today's Scripture readings by the Venerable Archbishop Fulton J Sheen:
"About the only kind of reform one hears about today is social reform, and God knows it is necessary. But it must not be forgotten that some people become social reformers in order to escape their own reformation. Communism is a very comfortable philosophy, because all the spots are on someone else’s linen. Democracy too has its social reformers who are busybodies righting everyone else’s conscience in order to escape adjusting their own. They clean up the parks and leave their own home a mess.
"It was against such false reformers that our Divine Master said: ‘How is it that you can see the speck of dust in your brother’s eye and are not aware of the beam which is in your own? You hypocrite, remove the beam from your own eye first and then you shall see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.’ This implies that all have some kind of stain. The cleanest wheat has some chaff in it. Before censoring others two questions should be asked: Is there more good than evil in what I am criticising? And, could I have done better? If there is more good than bad, we create false proportions by criticism. It is also easy to judge things that are done, but to do them is quite different. Any eye can see a crooked furrow, but who can plough a straight one? A great portrait artist was one day painting a picture of a lady who was constantly complaining: ‘Make my eyebrows more arched’; ‘Can’t you turn up my lips?’; ‘Take the wrinkle out of my brow.’ The artist then handed the brushes and paints to the lady to do her own portrait.
"One of the worst psychological defects of hypercriticism is that it completely destroys in the individual the capacity for self-knowledge. No man can know his own garden who is always looking over the wall. Never peering within his own soul creates a lack of humility of spirit which makes one kind and charitable to others. Never admitting his own faults, he acts towards his fellow man as a judge rather than a brother. The mind is unfitted for self-examination when it spends itself in detecting the faults of others. He who has been well trained in plucking the beam out of his own eye is always the most tender in plucking the splinter out of his brother’s.
"In vain does one search for other people’s scars when their own wounds are bleeding. Some people seem never to be happy until they have their fingers in other people’s sores, opening them afresh, never allowing them to heal, as if they were carrion rather than human. There are others who like to see their neighbour criticised and their reputations ruined in order that they might have the feeling that they are not so evil in comparison. The vultures are always the first to smell the carrion. Self-examination alone makes our judgement kindly. When we have wrestled with own faults, we have the insight and tact to help others. Massillon, the great French preacher, was once asked where he gained his extraordinary knowledge of the human passions and his skill in solving their complexities. His answer was; ‘From examining my own heart.’ In his pursuit of personal holiness he had met and vanquished, one by one, those bosom sins which trouble all men. This accounted for the pungency of his preaching which prompted Louis XIV to say: ‘I have heard many orators, and have been very much pleased with them, but every time I heard you I was displeased with myself.’
"The ability to administer to others is best acquired through self-treatment. As Francis Quarles once sagely remarked: ‘He who cleanses a blot with a blot will make a greater blot. Even the candle snuffers of the sanctuary are pure gold.’ This meant that the best reformation of others is by good example, such as a Florence Nightingale walking through a Crimean hospital, or a Xavier nursing the sick in India. If we cannot be trusted to keep our own soul clean then no one else should entrust their soul to us."
(Thoughts for Daily Living)
Prayer of Repentance
I beseech Thee, O Most Blessed Trinity, to shed the fire of Thy merciful love upon this most frigid heart, to let shine upon this most darkened mind, the light of the Son, in Whom alone is every grace and truth. Have pity on me, most Merciful God, and regard not my sins and offences, but in Thy mercy forgive me yet again, and grant me the graces to serve Thee now in fidelity and truth. Amen. 💐💖🙏