HOMILY OF 31ST SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (LOVE) — YEAR B
HOMILY THEME: LOVE IS THE GREATEST GIFT TO US
BY: Fr. Cyril Unachukwu
Deut. 6:2-6, Heb. 7:23-28, Mk. 12:28-34
God is not lawless and He never created us to be lawless either. Rather, He created us in His image and likeness that, obeying and living in accordance with His laws and commandments, we may live with Him forever in His Kingdom. As God is love, so also are His laws and commandments summarised in love, such that in loving Him and our brothers and sisters, we may gradually but steadily grow into a clearer image of the One Who created us out of love and, for the reason of the same love, saved us in Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit. May the love of God inspire all our thoughts, words and actions; Amen.
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For the Christian, to love is an imperative. It is an imperative, firstly, because God commands us to do so, secondly because it is impossible to speak of a Christian that cannot love and thirdly because only in love can we truly live and prosper. Through His words and actions, our Lord Jesus Christ made this very clear to us all throughout His life and ministry. The Gospel Reading of today (Mark 12:28-34) presents us with a very uncommon and friendly encounter between Jesus and a Scribe. This encounter bore the fruit of letting us know the nucleus of Jesus’ life and ministry and the motivating factor behind all He accomplished for our salvation. Responding to the question posed to him by one of the Scribes He declared the essence of the Christian law of life; “you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength… You must love your neighbour as yourself.” To love is the summary of all the commandments of God and the ability to love makes it possible for us to share and have a foretaste of the life of God even here on earth. The Law of Love is the secret of integral prosperity and increase. Whoever that cannot love cannot flourish! The message of God to His people through Moses in the First Reading (Deuteronomy 6:2-6) was explicit in highlighting the link between love and integral human flourishing; “listen then, Israel, keep and observe what will make you prosper and give you great increase… you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength.” In fact, the words of Moses were very magnetic in this regard. In other words, to love is to flourish, and flourishing entails loving! Hence, since God wishes us all to prosper and to flourish, He also wishes and invites us all to love. And since God is love and He invites us to love, God then is inviting us to come and share in His life. Hence, to love is the most successful secret key to Eternal Life – the Life of God!
It is a given that our world deeply and sincerely craves for love. Unfortunately, however, worldliness makes it very difficult to love. Worldliness literally suffocates the innate disposition in us to love. In fact, worldliness is the greatest obstacle to love. Worldliness is that disposition that empties love of its divine origin, reducing it to a simple feeling, a sensual orientation and an exhibition of material capacities. Worldliness makes us believe on externalities as the sign of love, whereas the fount of love is in the interior. Worldliness is the most powerful deception of our time. Whereas love is by nature divine and eternal, these human states and material things are transient and can easily fizzle out of existence. The divine and eternal natures of love are the foundation of the lasting nature of every human profession of love that is built on God. Outside this solid foundation, every human attempt to love becomes a profession of emptiness and void. This is partly the cause of the problems, of our disappointments and of the universal predicament of the human race. The world is partly languishing because the world has chosen not to love in God’s terms, and in most cases where it professes love, it does so within the terms of worldliness. Our Lord Jesus Christ is inviting us to a true profession and practice of love; the type of love that knows no bounds and limits; the type of love that flows from God and that leads back to God; the type of love that is salvific. This is the type of love that propels the eternal priesthood of Christ for which “His power to save is utterly certain, since He is living for ever to intercede for all who come to God through Him” (Hebrews 7:23-28). Only such type of love can transform the world! The Christian vocation to love is only in the terms of this divine and eternal love that possesses the power and the necessary accessories to transform, to establish, to prosper and to put flourishing in progress. This is the type of love we need in our families, in our relationships, in the Church, in our communities, in our places of work, in our countries and in the world at large. God is the only source of such love and Christ remains our only and surest pathway to accessing and possessing it in our lives.
Heavenly Father, we are certain that You love us and we sincerely wish to love as you commanded us to do. We are, however, often confused on what love truly means and on the best ways to put our profession of love into practice. Send to us Your Spirit of love, so that in possessing and practicing true love, we may be transformed so as to be able to transform the world; Amen. Happy Sunday.
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