30th Sunday Year A - Homily 5

Homily 5 - 2020

Remember the comment that Jesus made in last week’s Gospel… “Give back to God what are God’s”. Today’s Gospel spells out what he meant, “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind”. Jesus called this “the greatest and the first commandment”. The idea of commandment may not sit comfortably in relationships of deep love. The Mystery that is God stretches out infinitely beyond our clearest human expressions. At best, our words are like sign-posts. They face us in the right direction — but the right direction, while very helpful, is not the destination.

Yet, for those who truly love, the desires of the beloved can be experienced by the one who loves as non-negotiable need… “Commandment” goes close to defining the experience — but is not quite it. Jesus also said, “The second [commandment] resembles it: You must love your neighbour as yourself”. The word “resemble” may be another finger-post. It does not quite capture the real idea, but it points in the right direction.

Loving our neighbour as ourselves “resembles” the inner need to love God above everything in the sense that it makes God real, as it were, and connects heaven with earth. Through the created world of persons and things we engage with God “through whom all things are made”. And — wonderfully — when we truly love God, we find ourselves motivated and wanting to love our brothers and sisters whom God creates and eternally loves.

We are used to the idea of loving our neighbours at the individual, inter-personal level. Excellent! but that is too narrow a vision. The greatest good and the greatest harm are done to our neighbours within the world fashioned by politics — the practical shape that human relationships take at the community level.

God entrusted the created world, with all its fruitfulness, productivity and potential — the common wealth — to be shared equitably by all. Through means such as taxation, etc., our various leaders have the noble role to determine, on the community’s behalf, how that common wealth is shared equitably. As members of that commonwealth, we give our compliance with their directives, or our criticism and opposition to what we judge to be unfair, corrupt, partisan or ideologically polarised.

Within this realm of practical care for our neighbours, our love for God takes shape.