20181104
ENTERING INTO THE
PROMISED LAND
04 NOVEMBER,
2018, Sunday, 31st Week, Ordinary Time
Readings at Mass
Liturgical Colour:
Green.
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First reading
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Deuteronomy 6:2-6 ©
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You shall love the Lord your God with
all your heart
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Moses said to the people: ‘If you fear the
Lord your God all the days of your life and if you keep all his laws and
commandments which I lay on you, you will have a long life, you and your son
and your grandson. Listen then, Israel, keep and observe what will make you
prosper and give you great increase, as the Lord the God of your fathers has
promised you, giving you a land where milk and honey flow.
‘Listen,
Israel: the Lord our God is the one Lord. You shall love the Lord your God with
all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength. Let these words I
urge on you today be written on your heart.’
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Responsorial Psalm
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Psalm 17(18):2-4,47,51 ©
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I love you, Lord, my
strength.
I love you, Lord, my strength,
my rock, my fortress, my
saviour.
My God is the rock where I take refuge;
my shield, my mighty help, my
stronghold.
The Lord is worthy of all praise,
when I call I am saved from my
foes.
I love you, Lord, my
strength.
Long life to the Lord, my rock!
Praised be the God who saves
me,
He has given great victories to his king
and shown his love for his
anointed.
I love you, Lord, my
strength.
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Second reading
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Hebrews 7:23-28 ©
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Christ, because he remains for ever, can
never lose his priesthood
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There used to be a great number of priests
under the former covenant, because death put an end to each one of them; but
this one, because he remains for ever, can never lose his priesthood. It
follows, then, that his power to save is utterly certain, since he is living
for ever to intercede for all who come to God through him.
To
suit us, the ideal high priest would have to be holy, innocent and
uncontaminated, beyond the influence of sinners, and raised up above the
heavens; one who would not need to offer sacrifices every day, as the other
high priests do for their own sins and then for those of the people, because he
has done this once and for all by offering himself. The Law appoints high
priests who are men subject to weakness; but the promise on oath, which came
after the Law, appointed the Son who is made perfect for ever.
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Gospel Acclamation
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cf.Jn6:63,68
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Alleluia, alleluia!
Your words are spirit, Lord, and they are
life;
you have the message of eternal life.
Alleluia!
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Or:
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Jn14:23
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Alleluia, alleluia!
Jesus said: ‘If anyone loves me he will
keep my word,
and my Father will love him,
and we shall come to him.’
Alleluia!
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Gospel
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Mark 12:28-34 ©
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'You are not far from the kingdom of
God'
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One of the scribes came up to Jesus and
put a question to him, ‘Which is the first of all the commandments?’ Jesus
replied, ‘This is the first: Listen, Israel, the Lord our God is the one Lord,
and you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul,
with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: You must
love your neighbour as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.’
The scribe said to him, ‘Well spoken, Master; what you have said is true: that
he is one and there is no other. To love him with all your heart, with all your
understanding and strength, and to love your neighbour as yourself, this is far
more important than any holocaust or sacrifice.’ Jesus, seeing how wisely he
had spoken, said, ‘You are not far from the kingdom of God.’ And after that no
one dared to question him any more.
ENTERING INTO THE PROMISED LAND
SCRIPTURE READINGS: [ DT 6:2-6; HEB 7:23-28; MK 12:28-34 ]
We all seek happiness in
life. No one enjoys
suffering in any form, whether from hunger or from failed relationships.
We all seek meaning and purpose in life. This is what the Lord desires
for us as well. God wants to lead us to a land “where milk and honey
flow”, where there is plenty and where people live in love and in harmony.
In the first reading
from the book of Deuteronomy, Moses, who had led the people out of Egypt, the
land of slavery, into the desert was preparing them to enter the Promised Land. Moses did not want them to make the
same mistakes as their ancestors did. When the people rebelled against
God, the Lord said to them, “none of the people who have seen my glory and the
signs that I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and yet have tested me these
ten times and have not obeyed my voice, shall see the land that I swore to
give to their ancestors; none of those who despised me shall see it.” (Num 14:22f)
So Moses gave them the
commandments as the key to happiness in the Promised Land. “If you fear the Lord your God all
the days of your life and if you keep all his laws and commandments which I lay
on you, you will have a long life, you and your son and your grandson. Listen
then, Israel, keep and observe what will make you prosper and give you great
increase, as the Lord the God of your fathers has promised you, giving you a
land where milk and honey flow.” These commandments were the call to love
God with their entire being and to love their fellowmen, practicing justice and
compassion, not just among themselves but for the poor and the strangers.
However, over the years,
the commandments were elaborated and supplementary commandments were added to
specify the Mosaic Laws.
So much so that by the time of Jesus, there were 613 laws to be observed.
Some would demand that all must be obeyed equally, but some scholars make a
distinction between the major and minor laws. The truth is that it was
impossible to truly observe all the laws, not just in the letter but more so in
the spirit. Those who broke the laws were condemned as sinners and were
ostracized from the community. Those who tried to keep the laws, found them
onerous and burdensome. The smarter ones like the scribes and the
Pharisees would try ways to circumvent the law using legal interpretations.
Regardless, the laws in themselves could not give life and make Judaism
legalistic. Those who kept them became self-righteous; and those who
could not, gave up completely to a life of sin.
Indeed, this is the case
for Catholics as well. Many Catholics think that the Catholic Faith
consists of a set of divine and moral laws to be observed. Many obey them reluctantly for fear of
being punished in hell. So Catholics do good works in order to merit
salvation, not because they love God or their fellowmen. It is to earn
merits lest they go to hell. It is not about loving others or God but
protecting our interests and saving our souls.
What is the purpose of a
true religion? It is to give life to us. Jesus said, “I came that
they may have life, and have it abundantly.” (Jn 10:10) Religion should not rob us of our joy and
happiness in life. The laws are not meant to make us live in fear and
restrict our freedom. Rather, the laws enable us to live a life of true
freedom in the Spirit. St Paul wrote, “For freedom Christ has set us
free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of
slavery.” (Gal 5:1) “The fruit of
the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity,
faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such
things.” (Gal 5:22f)
Happiness in life therefore is to live in the freedom of the Spirit, which is
the freedom of love.
Indeed, there is only
one law; it is the law of mutual love.
“Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another
has fulfilled the law. The commandments … are summed up in this word,
‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’ Love does no wrong to a neighbour;
therefore, love is the fulfilling of the law.” (cf Rom 12:8-10) Loving our neighbours help
us to encounter God’s love through them. In loving them, they too will
encounter God’s love in us. So loving our neighbours can lead us to God
provided our love is pure, holy, sincere and unconditional. Indeed,
as John said, “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God
abides in them.” (1 Jn 4:16)
It is within this
context that we can understand the teaching of our Lord when He reduced all the
commandments to simply two, namely, love of God, self and neighour. “This is the first: Listen, Israel, the
Lord our God is the one Lord, and you must love the Lord your God with all your
heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. The
second is this: You must love your neighbour as yourself. There is no
commandment greater than these.”
However, the love of God
and neighbour presupposes that we are loved by God first. Why is this so? This is
because the capacity to love ourselves and others presupposes that we are loved
unconditionally first. We cannot give what we do not have; otherwise, we
will only make use of others to fill up the vacuum in our lives by loving them.
This so-called love of neighbour would not be unconditional but more a love for
self rather than the other. This explains why St John wrote, “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.” (1 Jn 4:7f) When
Moses said, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all
your soul, with all your strength”, it was in the context of how much God loved
them by delivering them from slavery, protecting and providing for them for the
journey.
The capacity to love
must come from God Himself. Pope Emeritus Benedict made it clear in his
first encyclical, “God is Love.” He said, “We have come to believe in God’s love: in
these words the Christian can express the fundamental decision of his life.
Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the
encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a
decisive direction.” (Deus est Carita 1) St John reiterated this
when he wrote, “God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only
Son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is
love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the
atoning sacrifice for our sins. Beloved, since God loved us so much, we
also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one
another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us.” (1 Jn 4:10-12)
Nevertheless, the point
for us Christians is that we have seen God in Christ. “And we have seen and do testify that the
Father has sent his Son as the Savior of the world. God abides in those
who confess that Jesus is the Son of God, and they abide in God. So we
have known and believe the love that God has for us.” (1 Jn 4:14-16) This is what the Lord told
His disciples, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father.” (cf Jn 14:9-11) In Christ, therefore we have
seen God, His unconditional love and mercy for us all.
This is what the second
letter of Hebrews wants us to found our faith on, namely, in the sacrificial
love of Christ for us.
Christ is our High Priest because He gave up His life as a sacrifice in
atonement for our sins. Because He lives forever in His resurrection, He
becomes for us our eternal High Priest.” By His example of total giving
to God and His fellowmen, Jesus leads the way for us to find fullness of life
through the love of God and others in total self-giving. Most of all,
even when we fail to love as He loved us because of human weakness, we are
assured that we are always forgiven. In this way, we will never hate
ourselves, but feel the love and mercy of God even more, and this makes it
possible for us to love others with the same love and mercy we have received
from Him.
In loving God who loves
us, we love all those whom He loves as well. As St John wrote, “Everyone who believes
that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the
parent loves the child. By this we know that we love the children of God,
when we love God and obey his commandments.” (1 Jn 5:1f) When we love someone, we seek
to please him or her in all things, especially by loving all those whom he or
she loves. Thus, the circle is complete. We begin by being loved by
God unconditionally, then we love ourselves and with this love in us, we want
to return that love to God and we do this concretely by loving Him in our
neigbours. With the scribe, we too must to the Lord, “Well spoken,
Master; what you have said is true: that he is one and there is no other. To
love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and strength, and to
love your neighbour as yourself, this is far more important than any holocaust
or sacrifice.”
Written
by The Most Rev William Goh, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Singapore © All
Rights Reserved
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