Homily: 31st Sunday in Ordinary Time
November 3, 2024
Dear brothers and sisters, both the first reading and the gospel reading of today invite us to a sincere love of God and love of neighbor which is the supreme commandment that God gave to us. I wonder whether there is any other thing that Jesus taught in the whole of the Sacred Scriptures that have more weight than the gospel message of love. The whole of Jesus’ teaching on earth can be summarized as love of God and love of neighbor, when you look at the way He lived and died, you will see that he really meant what he taught, He lived and died for the love He has for us.
Jesus’ disciples understood too well that the best way to describe God and our relationship with God is love, their writing always speaks volumes. St Paul for instance writing in 1st Cor 13:1, “if I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong and clanging cymbal.” St Peter in 1st Peter 4:8, wrote that “love covers a multitude of sins.” John who was always close to Jesus’ heart and had a first-hand taste of the love of God, on his part, wrote in 1st John 4:7-8, “beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God for God is love.”
When there is love on earth, the earth becomes like heaven, the impossible is made possible but the absence of love is a foretaste of the agony of hell fire. For instance, that golden retriever or German shepherd or Pitbull jumping up and down in the sofa in our living room belongs to the same family of big cats with the leopard, the chetah, the tiger or the lion. The teeth of our pet dog are not less harmful than the teeth of a wild fox or the coyote. Then why do we spend our hard-earned income feeding our pet dog while these other members of the same carnivorous family are seen as animals to be attacked. The answer is love. These our pets have stolen our hearts by showering us with love, so, they can go ahead and steal our car, even our bed but these other wild foxes and bear and leopard attack us, and we take them as enemies to be attacked. This example describes what happens when we show love and what happens when we live in hatred.
We must state it categorically clear, that love is not for the weak, it is for the strong. Love is not for the cowardly, it is for the courageous. Love is not just feeling good towards someone; rather it is willing the good of another. It is not a mere desire; it is a decision. It is an active and an ongoing process of constant giving. It requires an ongoing sacrifice. Husband and wife, father and son, mother and daughter must make the sacrifice for love to reign in our homes. We keep love warm by doing loving things to our loved ones.
If we love a person, that person’s presence is a joy. We long for his/her company when absent. We hasten back to that person at the first opportunity. We are prepared to do anything for him/her. We give our time, our energy, our thought, our talent ungrudgingly for him/her. And in all the sacrifices we make for that person, there is an element of joy. Brothers and sisters, this is what we must go out of way to do in order to live out this commandment of love of God and neighbor. We must give our time, energy, thought, talent to be near to God whom we love and do same also in the service of our neighbor for love to reign supreme in the world. In the gospel of today, Jesus told this scribe, you have answered well, you are not far from the kingdom of God. Living out this agape love is the via rail ticket that will take us directly before the throne of God in heaven.
