In the Gospel lesson of Luke 6:31-36, our Lord Jesus Christ teaches us to treat others as we want others to treat us. We are not to treat them as they treat us, but as we would want them to treat us. Here we find Christ fleshing out a bit what it means to love others as He loved us (John 15:12), which He Himself called His new commandment.
Do to others as you would have them do to you. “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again.
But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.
St. John Kronstadt (d. 1908) comments:
“Furthermore, love every man as yourself – that is, do not wish him anything that you would not wish for yourself; think, feel for him just as you would think and feel for your own self; do not wish to see in him anything that you that you do not wish to see in yourself; do not let your memory keep in it any evil caused to you by others, in the same way as you would wish that the evil done by yourself should be forgotten by others; do not intentionally imagine either in yourself or in another anything guilty or impure; believe others to be as well-intentioned as yourself, in general, if you do not see clearly that they are evilly disposed; do unto them as you would to yourself, or even do not do unto them as you would not do unto yourself, and then you will see what you will obtain in your heart – what peace, what blessedness! You will be in paradise before reaching it – that is, before the paradise in heaven you will be in paradise on earth. ‘The kingdom of God is within you,’ says the Lord. ‘He that dwelleth in love,’ teaches the Apostle, ‘dwelleth in God and God in him.’ ” (My Life in Christ, p 38)
Fraternized 