God's Compassion and Mercy

In today’s first reading, Micah 7: 14-15, 18-20, the prophet Micah prays to God as follows: 

Shepherd your people with your staff, the flock of your inheritance.…, as in the days when you came from the land of Egypt, show us wonderful signs. Who is there like you, the God who removes guilt and pardons sin for the remnant of his inheritance; who does not persist in anger forever, but delights rather in clemency, and will again have compassion on us, treading underfoot our guilt? You will cast into the depths of the sea all our sins; You will show faithfulness to Jacob,[Leah and Rachel], and grace to Abraham[and Sarah], as you have sworn to our fathers/[mothers] from days of old.

That message is given to us today as well as to the people of old.  We are “the flock” of God’s “inheritance.”  The land of Egypt symbolizes the places and times when we, like the Israelites, were/are victims of, or perpetrators of, sin:   selfishness, abuse of power and control, the sins of oppression and injustice, the exploitation of the poor and oppressed, persons engaging in deceitful behaviors and so on.  In today’s world slavery abounds, as it did in Egypt when God rescued His people. Today’s slavery includes  slave labor, making children and women slaves of the sex industry, of  drug trafficking, of those abusing their power, and so on.

Micah reminds us that when we lower ourselves to evil schemes and sin against others and against ourselves,  God “will again have compassion on us, treading underfoot our guilt.”  God does not condone our sinful behaviors but He does pardon us, has compassion on us, and, yes, “cast into the depths of the sea all of sins.”  This does not mean that we will not suffer the consequences of our sinful, selfish actions whereby the rights of others are trampled upon.  It does mean that, when we turn to God in repentance, God is merciful and forgiving!

With the psalmist in today’s responsorial psalm, Psalm 85,  we pray: “Restore us, O God our savior, and abandon your displeasure against us….Show us, O Lord, your kindness, and grant us your salvation.”