Sunday, October 27, 2002
30th Sunday in Ordinary Time
1st Reading: Ex 22:20-26
The Lord said to Moses, "Tell the people of Israel this: You shall not wrong or oppress a stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.
You shall not harm the widow or the orphan. If you do harm them and they cry out to me, I will hear them and my anger will blaze and I will kill you with the sword, and your own wives will be widows and your own children orphans.
If you lend money to any of my people who are poor, do not act like a moneylender and do not charge him interest.
If ever you take a person's cloak as a pledge, you must give it back to him by sunset, for it is all the covering he has for his body. In what else will he sleep? And when he cries to me I will hear him, for I am full of pity."
2nd Reading: 1 Thes 1:5-10
Brothers and sisters, you know how we dealt with you for your sake.
In return, you became followers of us and of the Lord when, on receiving the word, you experienced the joy of the Holy Spirit in the midst of great opposition. And you became a model for the faithful of Macedonia and Achaia, since from you the word of the Lord spread to Macedonia and Achaia, and still farther. The faith you have in God has become news in so many places that we need say no more about it. Others tell of how you responded to us and turned from idols to the Lord. For you serve the living and true God, and you wait for his Son from heaven whom he raised from the dead, Jesus, who frees us from impending trial.
Gospel:
Mt 22:34-40
When the Pharisees heard how Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,
they came together. One of them, a teacher of the Law, tried to test him
with this question, "Teacher, which is the most important commandment
in the Law?"
Jesus answered, "You shall love the Lord, your God,
with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. This is
the first and the most important of the commandments. But after this there
is another one very similar to it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
The whole Law and the Prophets are founded on these two commandments."
Commentary
I remember one of the last public lectures given by Karl Rahner, a great theologian of the previous century. It was in a way the summary of an entire life thinking of God. He came to tell us that we cannot know God through our thoughts and our reason. The only way is that of love. By loving we come to know God because God is love. I was impressed by this man's sharing: what was vital to him after so many years of teaching and writing about theology. It could not be possible in any other way. Therefore the only real Commandment we Christians have is to love God and our brothers and sisters. Just to love.