More Reality TV

Look out, Dr. Phil! Move over, Tony Robbins. Mr. T. is on a mission to change real people's lives. In TV-Land's new Reali Tee show, Mr. T. dishes out a new kind of self-help and, of course, the name of the show is I Pity the Fool.
But this might not exactly line up with what Jesus says in the Gospel today. "Whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liable to fiery Gehenna." Jesus demands forgiveness in response to anger: 'Love your enemies'; 'turn the other cheek'; 'forgive 70 times 7 (i.e., endlessly)'On anger itself Jesus made rigorous demands, though not ones unknown within his Jewish milieu: 'If you are angry with a brother you will be liable to judgment . So when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there . and go, first be reconciled' (Matt 5. 22-24). So anger - according to Jesus - must be overcome, controlled, dissipated, and as soon as possible, Quoting from Psalm 4. 4, the epistle to the Ephesians insists: 'Be angry and sin not. Do not let the sun go down on your anger' (Eph. 4. 26). So dissipate that anger before sundown or at least before the Mr. T. show comes on. If not, it will lead to judgement - God's wrath against us. So there is an implicit distinction here between righteous divine wrath and sinful human negative rage, the latter of which must be speedily overcome. How to overcome? Leave your gift: a gesture of humility. On the cross Jesus did not get angry with his enemies when he had every right to.
Surely if Jesus had said that anger could lead to damnation it could not here be encouraged. The only way around this problem was to make a further distinction within human anger, between 'righteous indignation' on the one hand (such as evidenced by Jesus himself in the cleansing of the Temple), and 'sinful anger' on the other, the former being wholly justified in some circumstances, but never if it led to the destructive consequences of the latter: either prophetic, righteous anger or negative, destructive anger.

In Paul's letter to the Galatians in chapter 5, Paul lists, on the one hand, the 'works of the flesh', which include 'enmities, strife, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions ..', and on the other hand, the 'fruit of the Spirit': 'love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control' (vs. 22-23). These are gifts of grace through faith in Christ. The prayers of Jesus' forgiveness from the cross has enabled us to receive these gifts from the Father through the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit reconciles us to God and to one another if we can these gift with wholeness and totality of heart. Receiving the gift of the Eucharist means letting go of our weapons, our grudges, our resentments and picking up the gift that is Jesus himself.