“What is the greatest commandment in the law?”  Once again the Pharisees are asking a dishonest question in an attempt to trap Our Lord: another question with only wrong answers. If you really can interpret the Scriptures, can you tell us the most important passage?  They were, of course, ready to jump on anything he said: What about the Ten Commandments?  What about the Creation of the World?  What about the promise of salvation?  What about dot-dot-dot.  Jesus, who is the Truth itself, cannot be deceived or led astray in these rhetorical back-alleys.  He not only disarms the Pharisees in their verbal trickery, he in fact manages to use the opportunity to provide an incredible synthesis of the Old Testament.  And it’s a great thing for us too: What do these incredible stories of patriarchs and prophets, pharaohs and kings, men and angels, really have to do with us, besides giving us some exciting stories to tell?  How do these stories affect our lives?  What are we supposed to do differently because of them?  The whole of the Old Testament, in fact the whole of scripture as we now have them in their fullness, are so meaningful for our daily lives because of just what Our Lord has pointed out: they teach us to love God above all things with our whole being, and to love our neighbor as ourselves.  When Jesus Christ comes, as the fullness of Revelation, he brings to completion these two ideals, in himself: the man who loves the Father totally and submits himself completely to God’s plan.  And also the man who loves his brothers and sisters so much that he goes all the way to the end for them, even to death, despite being completely innocent of any sin whatsoever.  Perfect love of the Father and obedience to him and his will.  Perfect love of his brothers and sisters, love that will do anything for the good of the ones who are loved. 

St. Augustine has a famous saying: “Love and then do what you will.”  Some people have interpreted this to mean that if you have a spirit of love in your heart, your individual actions don’t matter that much; you can basically do whatever you feel like.  But that’s not what St. Augustine meant.  What he meant was this: if you love God above all things, with your whole heart, mind, and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself, then all your actions will proceed from that love, and what you want to do, will gradually become more and more aligned to what you should do.  In other words, things like observing the 10 Commandments, keeping the precepts of the Church, going to Mass, going to confession, living the Church’s teachings about the sanctity of human life and of marriage: these things might seem  a little burdensome at first, can seem like they are restricting us, or holding us down.  But, St. Augustine’s great insight is this: as we become more and more truly conformed to Jesus Christ, as we live a life of true, self-sacrificial love, then these things that God gives us will become pure joy; they will become second-nature, just part of who we are.  We can love and do what we want, because what we want, will be to truly love.  We will have developed the habit of doing good and avoiding evil.  Now this kind of progress is not a straight line of course.  We zig and zag a bit as our sins and weaknesses rear their ugly heads.  But we keep pushing forward, never giving up in the face of our weakness.  And with God’s grace, even with the little bumps along the way, the trend line is upward, all the way to heaven. 

Let us take a small step on that marvelous journey today, by committing ourselves anew to the love and service of God and of our neighbor.  Let us prepare to receive the food that will truly nourish us in our pursuit of a life filled with love: let us prepare to welcome into our hearts, love Himself, and allow him to transform us in his own image.