Return to Jerusalem

I want you to imagine Jesus Christ and his disciples going to Washington DC. What do you think would happen? I imagine it would be fairly similar to what happens when he goes to Jerusalem. He would first be greeted by cheering crowds as he entered. Many of those in power would sense a potential problem for them: an eccentric preacher from the middle of nowhere, from Nazareth, a place even one of his apostles says nothing good can come out of, is drawing large, uncontrollable, crowds. Even worse, there are undertones within his message that are heavily critical of them: implied in some of his messages is that God has rejected those currently in authority, and will replace them, although Jesus has no involvement in anything directly revolutionary. As he continues to draw crowds, some of those who are engaged in the issues of the day, from all different political sides and parties, would approach him and try to embarrass and humiliate him by asking trick questions: they will try to trap him into unpopular positions or lead him on with questions that will serve their agendas.

Today’s reading happens in something like that context. Jesus has recently entered Jerusalem, greeted by crowds. He went to the temple, and immediately overturned the tables of the money changers and drove out those who were profiting off of the worship of God. He is then asked trick questions by a variety of people from different factions of the Jerusalem elite. We have heard some of these stories over the past few weeks. The chief priests and elders demand to know the source of his authority. The Pharisees ask him if it is lawful to pay taxes to Caesar. The Sadducees ask him a trick question about the resurrection of the dead. In each case, he turns around the question and leaves his interlocutors unable to respond.

 At this point, the great opponents of the Sadducees, the Pharisees, return to ask their next trick question. One of them, a scholar of the Law, an expert on the Mosaic law, thinks he has found the question that will finally stump Jesus. He asks Jesus which commandment of the law is the greatest. This is not an easy question. The Mosaic law itself covers 5 books of the Old Testament, all of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, besides all the traditions and customs that had been built up over time.

The political situation of Jerusalem gives even more ways almost any answer could go wrong. There is an unpopular foreign power, Rome, that directly controls the province. Just before Jesus, and continuing just after, there were many attempted revolts led by various false Messiahs. Beyond the political division, there was also religious division within Judaism: there were the Pharisees and Sadducees. The Pharisees generally accept all the books of the prophets and believe in a tradition of laws handed down from generation to generation. The Sadducees, on the other hand, only accepted the Torah, the first five books of the Bible, and placed more emphasis on the Temple worship in Jerusalem.

So, to answer the question, Jesus needs to give some answer that can satisfy both Sadducees and Pharisees, while not offending the Romans or the people ready to revolt against Rome at any notice. And Jesus gives the perfect answer. He cites two different passages from the Torah and combines them into the law of love. This law would become the foundational moral principle for His followers, from the time when Jesus was in Jerusalem through to us today. The first passage he cites comes from the book of Deuteronomy. It forms part of the Shema Yisrael, “Hear, O Israel,” the centerpiece of Jewish morning and evening prayer services. The passage in Deuteronomy reads: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.” So, when Jesus says the first and greatest commandment of the Law is “You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind,” he is saying something no Jewish person could object to.

The second passage, which Jesus says is a commandment that is like the first, comes from the book of Leviticus. The book of Leviticus states: “You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason with your neighbor, lest you bear sin because of him. You shall not take vengeance or bear any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.” Again, Jesus selects the key portion, and gives the second law that is like the first greatest commandment: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” He removes the conditions given in Leviticus for this love and gives a law that fulfills and completes the love of God spoken of in the first and greatest commandment.

Jesus has given a perfect answer in the moment to that Scholar of the Law. He has instantly selected two passages from the law that have such applicability to the entirety of the moral life that he can say that the entirety of the Jewish scriptures, the Law and the Prophets, depend on these two commandments. Jesus has such a command of the Old Testament Scriptures, including the Law given to Moses by God, that he can pick out two verses that perfectly and fully answer the attempt at a trick question.

Of course, through the Gospels, Jesus is not just talking to a group of Pharisees in Jerusalem, but also to us. And so we are called to follow and live by these two commandments, as the greatest commandments on which all others depend. You shall love the Lord your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. But this is much easier to say than to do. What does it mean to love God with your entire heart, your whole soul, and all of your mind? How can you love your neighbor as yourself?

An answer to this question is found in the second reading. St. Paul commends the Thessalonians for becoming a model for all those who believe in Christ throughout Macedonia and Achaia: that is throughout Greece. How have they done this? They recognized Paul as a saint and began to imitate Christ and to imitate St. Paul. This is even easier for us to do than it was for the Thessalonians. We have 2000 years of saints beyond St. Paul that can serve as models for how we can live the life of love that Jesus has called all of us to. So, let’s quickly run through a couple of models of sanctity we were given in the last century.

St. Teresa of Calcutta was born in Albania. As a young woman, she joined the Sisters of Loreto and was sent as a missionary to India. There, she taught in the school run by the nuns and became aware of the plight the poor in Calcutta faced. Eventually, she was permitted to found a new order, the Missionaries of Charity, dedicated to serving these poor people. She adopted a habit based on local, Indian dress. Her work led to a rapid expansion of the order, and she was even recognized by being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979. Throughout her work with the poor, she continued the full life of prayer she had been called to as a nun. In everything she did, she exemplified both the love of God and the love of neighbor. This did not prevent her from facing hardship and trial: she had an extensive “night” where she felt separated from God. Nevertheless, she persevered in both her prayer and her work and was canonized, and officially recognized as a saint, in 2016, only 19 years after her death.

St. Pius of Pietrelcina was an Italian Capuchin. When he was 31, he received the stigmata: his hands, feet, and sides began to show copies of Christ’s wounds. He became widely known as a holy man and was sought out for confessions. More miracles happened around him: people testified to him being in multiple places at once, bilocating, and to his ability to read souls while hearing confession. He became exceptionally popular: San Giovanni Rotondo, the Franciscan house where he lived, became a major pilgrimage site. He used his popularity to build a new hospital in the region. Nevertheless, the Church regarded him with suspicion: both Pius XI and John XXIII restricted his ministry, and John XXIII had the authority for the hospital fully transferred to the Vatican. Padre Pio obeyed. Under Paul VI, he was restored to full ministry. Throughout his life, his love for God and his love for his neighbors were clear in his actions: in his obedience to the Church, his work for souls as a confessor, and the physical help for others he promoted through his life, as well as his fidelity to the life of prayer and poverty he had committed himself to by joining the Capuchins. He was canonized in 2002 by Pope John Pual II, another 20th-century saint who had had a great devotion to Padre Pio, and had once been one of the pilgrims who went to visit San Giovanni Rotondo.

These are only two brief examples. Throughout the Church’s history, there have been thousands of saints canonized by the Church, and likely millions of other saints who have not been officially recognized in any way. This Wednesday, on All Saint’s Day, we will commemorate all of them. Each of them presents for us a model of a life of love that we can imitate. All of them present the two-fold love of God and neighbor. Each of them can help us to imitate the love Christ showed for us by offering Himself on the cross for our sins. St. Pius of Pietrelcina and St. Teresa of Calcutta, pray for us.