This Sunday, we read: You have heard that it was said: “an eye for an eye,” (which was already tremendous progress) —but Jesus continues: “if one slaps you on the right cheek, you also turn the other cheek.”
Turn the other cheek, which means unarmed and not instilling fear. Jesus does not propose the morbid passivity of the weak but a decisive and courageous initiative: Instead of hurt, Jesus asks you to reconnect; you take the first step, forgiving, starting over, courageously patching up the fabric of life continually torn by violence.
Christianity is not a religion of enslaved people who lower their heads and do not react; it is not the morality of the weak, which denies the joy of living, but the religion of humans who are intrinsically free, like kings, masters of their own choices even in the face of evil. Capable of defusing the spiral of revenge and devising new reactions through the creativity of love, which shatters agendas because it doesn’t take an eye for an eye, messing up the rules, but ultimately makes us happy.
Jesus says: Love, pray, give, bless, lend: referred to friends and enemies.
These are not precepts but offerings of power; it’s the transmission of divine life from God to humans; you are in this world to give life, not to take it.
Our identity: We are the image and likeness of God.
