Today’s Liturgy of the Word finds us in the midst of two series of readings from two of the most important passages in the New Testament, both concluding next Sunday as we turn the corner into Lent.
Some of you may have noticed this, if you pay close attention to the readings, perhaps reading at home before Mass, either online or in a missalette or perhaps on a smartphone app. (It’s very easy to find the Mass readings, and reading them ahead of time is a wonderful way to prepare for Mass and to participate more fully in the Liturgy of the Word, having familiarized yourself with what will be proclaimed that day from the word of God.)
All month long, some of you may have noticed, our second reading has been from St. Paul’s great catechesis on the resurrection of the body from 1 Corinthians 15. And for three Sundays — last week, this week, and next week — the Gospel readings are from the so-called “Sermon on the Plain” in Luke 6, covering some of the same central teachings of our Lord as the longer and more famous Sermon on the Mount in Matthew’s Gospel.
The New Testament includes 27 books divided up into 260 chapters — I Googled it — all equally the word of God, all equally true, all important, but not all equally important, as the truths of our faith are not all equally important. There’s a hierarchy.
I’m holding a copy of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. It’s a big book because our faith contains a great many truths, as a church is made up of a great many stones, but in any structure some parts are more critical than others.
Does anyone remember a while back when the statue of St. Matthew high up on our steeple fell to the ground? Thank God no one was underneath when it fell! Anyway, it was replaced and St. Matthew is back up there with Mark, Luke, and John.
We love our statue of St. Matthew, but in the structure of this church there are more important parts. Most of us didn’t even know when the statue fell or was put back, but if one or more of these columns came down, that would be a much bigger deal for the structural integrity of this building. The columns are more critical. Not the most critical. In any building, what’s the most critical part? What does everything depend on? The foundation! Nothing is more fundamental than the foundation.
What is the foundation of our faith? What is most important? Some of my children may be smiling; they’ve all sat through my CCD classes more than once, and they sometimes joke about how many different things I’ve said are “the most important” or “the greatest” in one way or another: love, the Incarnation of God in Jesus, the crucifixion, the Resurrection, Baptism, the Eucharist, the Mass, the Virgin Mary, and so on.
All of these things are crucial in different ways, not unlike these pillars, or even more so — but all of them rest upon one fundamental truth, and the Catechism tells us what it is.
The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life. It is the mystery of God in himself. It is therefore the source of all the other mysteries of faith, the light that enlightens them. It is the most fundamental and essential teaching in the “hierarchy of the truths of faith.” (CCC 234)
The Catechism goes on to explain that the doctrine of the Trinity reveals the inner life of God as a life of love: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (CCC 257). So many things in our faith are in one way or another “the most important” or “the greatest,” but the key to all of them is the foundational truth that God is love, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Take these two important passages, 1 Corinthians 15 and Luke 6, which together bring us to the threshold of Lent.
1 Corinthians 15, St. Paul’s teaching on the resurrection of the body, begins with these words, which we heard in the second reading two weeks ago:
I handed on to you as of first importance what I also received:
that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures;
that he was buried;
that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures;
that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve…
Our Lord’s death and Resurrection are “of first importance,” St. Paul tells us. The Catechism says, “The Paschal mystery of Christ's cross and Resurrection stands at the center of the Good News,” the gospel. This is why we’re here today, on the first day of the week, the Lord’s Day, in honor of Jesus’ Resurrection, to celebrate his Paschal Mystery in the holy sacrifice of the Mass.
The coming season of Lent is a pilgrimage to the great celebration of the Paschal Mystery at Holy Week and especially the Paschal Triduum, the evening of Holy Thursday to Easter Sunday, climaxing in the Easter Vigil Mass, “the greatest and most noble of all solemnities,” the Roman Missal teaches. (See, so many things are “the greatest” in one way or another!)
The Paschal Mystery is the greatest manifestation of Trinitarian love the world has ever seen. God the Father “so loved the world that he gave us only Son.” “But God shows his love for us in this: that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us.” “Greater love has no one than this, that one should lay down one’s life for his friends.”
[Pointing to the large crucifix next to the ambo] This is our salvation; it is also our model. We are called to love as Christ loved, selflessly, sacrificially, so becoming partakers of God’s own Trinitarian life. And this brings us to Luke 6.
“Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.”
In these daunting words from Jesus’ Sermon on the Plain, the greatest commandment comes into sharpest focus. Which commandment is the greatest, the one that sums up all the rest? The answer, of course, is love: love of God and love of neighbor. In today’s Gospel Jesus unpacks for us some of what this means.
First, and most broadly, “Do to others as you would have them do to you.” The Golden Rule that sums up the Law and the Prophets — everything commanded and taught in the Old Testament. It’s really just another way of saying “Love your neighbor as you love yourself”: Treat others the way you want to be treated — not only by others, but also by God! The measure we give will be the measure we get; if we are generous and forgiving with others, God will be generous and forgiving with us. If we’re harsh and judgmental with others, how can we hope for God’s mercy?
Treat others the way you want to be treated — not necessarily how we feel like treating them, or how they deserve to be treated, if we can even judge such a thing. Not how they treat us. Do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.
If it seems too hard at first to pray for those who hate us, how about those we hate, or are tempted to hate, or have the hardest time loving? People who are in some way a trial to us, who rub us the wrong way or with whom we may have some grievance?
This morning I happened to look at my Facebook Memories, and it just happens that five years ago today two friends of opposite political leanings each happened to post about praying for people on the other side from them. A conservative friend posted, “I should have prayed for President Obama more,” and a progressive friend posted about praying for a very rightwing public figure, Milo Yiannopoulos. And my thought was, “With Lent coming on, what a great examination of conscience: ‘Who makes me angry/bitter/contemptuous/disgusted/etc. that I ought to be praying for, or praying for more?’”
If you’re thinking about Lenten disciplines, one thing you might consider, if you aren’t doing it already, is reading the Mass readings before Mass. Here’s another: Make a list of people that you’re not inclined to pray for, and pray for them every day. Ask God to give you real charity for them: the love with which Jesus prayed for those crucifying him. Only through the love of God rooted in our hearts can we hope to be partakers of God’s Trinitarian life and be built as living stones in the spiritual house that is the church of Christ, with Christ himself as its cornerstone.
Copyright © 2000– Steven D. Greydanus. All rights reserved.