HOMILY – 31ST SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME – YEAR B

As you will have recognised from today’s gospel, the first requirement of the good Jew was to acknowledge God, and this meant to recognise that he is the one and only God, unique and incomparable; transcendant, of which no image can be made; there is no other. It is the shma of Israel since the time of Moses, and was quoted by Jesus straight out of the book of Deuteronomy. This showed Jesus to be true to the tradition of Jewish beliefs. Let us remember that this ‘monotheism’ was a far cry from beliefs of other peoples at that time and earlier. The ancient world was emerging from belief in a plethora of anthromorphic gods who behaved like humans and who tormented humans if they did not do their bidding. Later had come the gods of, for instance, Canaan: Baal, god of life & fertility, Mot, the god of death & sterility, and later still the Greek and Roman pantheons. The Jewish faith in one transcendant God marked a considerable advance, so much so that at the time of Jesus it was the envy of much of the ancient world which had grown tired and incredulous of Zeus or Jupiter; Poseidon or Neptune, and their like.

But today the temptation is not to believe in any God at all. Our culture of technology and well-being rests on the belief that basically we can manufacture our own welfare. The question about God is leaving the stage. Being on the lookout for Him means moving out onto another level of life and, for some, there is little motivation to do so. But if we only believe what he can see with our own eyes, then we are really blind. God has repeatedly verified his identity. The marvel of the physical world is a continual ringing testimony to him. The intelligence which permeates it demonstrates that it has a source beyond itself. The resurrection of Christ is the validation by God of Jesus as come from God. This faith is continually put to the test, whether we are Jew or Christian, and must be purified in its own turn, but it is the fundamental norm and over-arching principle in the life of the believer.  Daily the Jew will twice recite the Shma, and we, on Sundays, recite our expanded Creed, accepting God’s preeminent position in our lives. The Judeo-Christian tradition is at one on this.

And the shma prevails upon God’s people to love Him ‘with all their heart’ and it justifies this demand because God loved his people first. He brought them out of slavery, and offered them the covenant at Sinai in order for them to remain in his love, with a view to his leading them to a land of milk and honey. God is inviting filial love from his people, not servile fear, so as to keep them in his love and benefiting from it.

But, to return to our gospel, we notice that both Jesus and the scribe went beyond the simple shma of Deuteronomy which we have been considering.  Jesus, and then the scribe after him, included an additional element, from the book of Leviticus, the precept ‘to love one’s neighbour as oneself’. And in this we note that Jesus innovates. Unlike for the scribe, or other world religions and philosophies where we find the same ethic, love of neighbour for Jesus is not an ethic distinct from love of God; the two are one; they are inseparable.He refers to them as one commandment. That is the kind of worship God wants from us. Love of God is impossible without love of neighbour.  The  social commandment is now a theological commandment; the theological commandment has a social character. It is not enough just to be a good practising person, keeping all the observances and rules; one’s love must acknowledge both God and neighbour. Then one is not far from the Kingdom of God.

This, specifically ‘Christian’ teaching on love, as for the Jewish obedience to the commandments, comes about as a response to the recognition the what God has done for us first of all. We all recognise that each and every one of us has been made in the image of God. The Christian recognises, as Pope Benedict has written, that ‘it is only because God  knew me and loved me that I was made. I have not been thrown into the world by some operation of chance and now have to do my best to swim around in the ocean of life, but I am preceded by a perception of me, an idea and a love of me. They are present in the ground of my being.’ Recognising this makes it possible for us to love in return(1 Jn 4:19), and to pass that love on to others. Because we have received royally, we pass it on. Again the social and theological are one.

So, to conclude, it seems to me that the capacity to love ultimately comes from faith, the recognition of a love that precedes a people (as for the Jews), that precedes each individual, (for Christians). With the dimming of faith society will become harsher, more violent and more corrosive. But conversely, continued faith in the indestructible love of God will have a refining effect and bring great goodness as love spreads and propagates itself. It is our privilege as believers to contribute to this.

Fr. John O’Callaghan

 

 

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