The older law seemed the natural thing to do: Love your neighbour, hate your enemy. Jesus' demand seems to ask too much. We may be prepared to try not hating but loving, that's really too much to ask. Could we just try to ignore them? Perhaps we are misled by the word 'love' here. Jesus is not asking us to have warm affection for them or to 'fall in love with them' or even to be friends with them. 'Love' here really means that I am filled with a deep concern for their well-being. Who really needs my prayers and concern more than a person who is acting in a way that is destructive to himself and others? Jesus never hated anyone. When people misbehaved, he wanted to reach out and help them to change. That is why he spent so much time with sinners. It was not because he was 'in love' with them but because they needed the care he was offering them. Jesus tells us that God treats every single person equally, each one gets the same amount of his infinite love. He asks us to try to do the same. If we really think about it, it is the only way to go. The way of hate has no future - for me or for anyone else.