October 26^th 2014.  Thirtieth Sunday of Ordinary Time

Gospel: Matthew 22:34-40

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­Translated from a homily by Don Fabio Rosini, broadcast on Vatican Radio

Don Fabio’s reflection follows the Gospel reading ...

(Check us out on Facebook – Sunday Gospel Reflection)

GOSPEL Matthew 22:34-40

When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees they got together and,
to disconcert him, one of them put a question,
‘Master, which is the greatest commandment of the Law?’
Jesus said,
‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart,
with all your soul, and with all your mind.
This is the greatest and the first commandment.

The second resembles it:
You must love your neighbour as yourself.
On these two commandments hang the whole Law, and the Prophets also.’

The Gospel of the Lord: Praise to you Lord Jesus Christ

Kieran’s summary . . . The first reading language is very threatening. We are to help the widow and orphan, but if we don’t help them then our wives will become widows and our children orphans! This menacing language of the Old Testament Law was a way of expressing the conviction that a life lived contrary to the law led to death. It is helpful to read Jesus’ words in the Gospel in the same way. Jesus tells us to love God totally and to love our neighbour as ourselves. Do we think that these words of Jesus are an optional extra for living a meaningful life? Are we inclined to think that religion or altruism are things that enhance life, but that we can still live a worthwhile existence without them? No! Jesus’ exhortation to love God and neighbour must be understood as activities that are absolutely necessary if we are to have any kind of authentic existence at all. A life that is not built on love of God and neighbour is still biological life, but it is not life in the fullest sense of the word. And love must be total if it is to be authentic. Jesus does not say, “Love God with your heart, mind and soul”; he says “Love God with all your heart, mind and soul”. If my love holds something back for myself, then it is not real love but something conditional, instrumental, ultimately directed towards self. Our love must be something that prevails in all circumstances. It must continue right to the end. Only Jesus can teach us to love in this way and only he can give us the grace to learn to love in this way. Once we have learned this kind of love for God and neighbour, then we have learned to live authentically.

The first reading language seems harsh, but the language is a way of expressing the conviction that there was no life beyond the Law

The first reading from the book of Exodus gives regulations for the welcome and care to be given to the stranger, the poor, the widow and the orphan. This serves as a prelude for the introduction of the greatest commandment in the Gospel. Jesus says. “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second resembles it: You must love your neighbour as yourself”. The first reading and the Gospel have much in common, but there are also differences that are unsettling. The first reading warns that if we are harsh with the widow or the orphan, then the Lord will hear their cry and our wives will become widows and our children orphans! This vengeful language of the Old Testament Law makes us feel uncomfortable, but there is a certain rationale behind it. The laws and regulations enunciated in the Old Testament books were laws that facilitated life. Beyond these laws there was no life. The threatening language was a way of expressing the deeply held conviction of the people that an existence lived contrary to the Law was an existence that was directed towards death.

When Jesus exhorts us to love God and neighbour, we should interpret this “law” in the light of the Old Testament way of looking at law: loving God and neighbour is absolutely essential for life; anything less will lead to death

With this appreciation of the meaning of the language of the Old Testament, let us re-evaluate Sunday’s Gospel. The Pharisees ask Jesus to state the greatest commandment of the Law. In response, Jesus states the principal commandment and adds to it another commandment that was already considered highly significant in rabbinical thought. What Jesus is doing seems not that novel really, but he makes clear that loving God and loving neighbour is one unified activity. Any approach that focusses exclusively on either one or the other is mistaken. All of this might sound very reasonable and not very original. But once we read the Gospel in the light of the first reading, then Jesus’ message becomes much more radical. In the Old Testament approach, any failure to live up to the demands of the Law led to death. Living the Law led to life. It would be a mistake, therefore, to think that Jesus’ exhortation to love God with all of our heart is a call to something that is not strictly obligatory or necessary, a call to something that we can survive without. The Old Testament language reminds us that we cannot live authentically if we do not love God and neighbour truly. We can live in a biological sense, but the fullness of life is impossible outside of this act of loving God and neighbour. Loving God and neighbour is not a noble option that we may or may not select. It is an absolute necessity.

Love is not authentic if it is not total. Jesus gives us a “law” that leads to life, but it only leads to life if it is total

Jesus does not say, “Love God with your heart, mind and soul”. He says, “Love God with all your heart, all your mind and all your soul”. “All” is a small word, but if love is to be authentic then it must be complete. If I love another only to the extent that it suits me, then that love is only in service of my self. Even if my love seems “almost” complete, the fact that I reserve something for myself indicates that it is an act that is ultimately conditional. If my love is something that I will abandon in certain circumstances, then it is not love at all in the real sense of the word. Loving God is something that is necessary for our happiness and completion. It is not an optional extra that I can do more or less well without. Woe to us if we present love of God as something that simply enhances life! Love of neighbour is the same act as loving God and it is something that we cannot survive without. Our life is not authentic if it is not saturated with love for God and neighbour. We have desperate need to love truly, to love right to the end. This activity constitutes our very being. That is why we must cling to the Lord who teaches us how to love. That is why we need the grace that flows from God’s love of us. We need to enter into relationship with others and ourselves, calling on the help of the Lord. He is the origin of our need to love.