Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A)

 

Ex 22.20-26;  

Ps 17;  

I Thess 1.5-10;  

Mt 22.34-40

 


LOVING GOD FOR THE SAKE OF GOD ALONE 


In today's reading from St Matthew’s Gospel, Our Lord tells the Pharisees that the two greatest commandments are, first, to love the Lord our God with our whole being and, second, to love our neighbour as ourselves. Jesus explains that these two commandments underpin all the commandments of the Law. The great theologian Saint Thomas Aquinas observes that the second commandment—to love our neighbour—follows from the first. When we truly love our neighbour, we also honour God, for humanity was made in the image and likeness of God. If we genuinely love God, we will also love our neighbours, recognising that we are brothers and sisters, children of the same Father and redeemed by the blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ. As Saint John writes in his First Letter, 'This commandment we also have from Him, that he who loves God should love his brother also.' Love of neighbour for God's sake is a clear expression of our love for God. Saint John continues, 'If anyone says, "I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar.'


More so, today's Gospel reminds us that all He has commanded is summed up in loving God and loving our neighbour. To show us how to love God and understand His love for us, Jesus says, "I am the way, the truth and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me." He entrusts the Church with making this known: that He is the path to God. All the faithful are called to proclaim, through both word and example, the faith they have received. This is the mission Christ gives to us all: to continue His work by sharing the truths of God and inviting everyone to make them their own. Christ promises to remain with the Church in this mission. He has sent the Holy Spirit to guide and protect the Church and to strengthen her work for His kingdom.


We see this commandment at work in St Paul's letter to the Thessalonians. He writes, 'the gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction. You became imitators of us and of the Lord, so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and Achaia. For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere.' Saint Paul's joy in the conduct of the Church in Thessalonica is evident. By living the Christian life, they helped spread the good news of Christ. His preaching and example, followed by theirs, bore the fruit of conversion—the purpose of Gospel preaching. 


Do  we love God because we fear God or because of his benefits? Is our ordering of our life based on the fear of hell or because we want something out of God? Let us love God for the sake of God alone. Prompter ipsum solum. That is the highest kind of love summum bonum. That is the basic. And so,we fulfil Our Lord's commandment when we love God and our neighbour as ourselves.


“The more I contemplate God the more God looks on me. The more I pray the more he thinks of me too”-st Bernard of clairvaux

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