Love God above all else

Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A

The Pharisees come to the Lord with a question that sounds pious but is really a test: “Master, which is the greatest commandment of the Law?” This was not a genuine question born out of sincere curiosity. In fact, it is quite likely they know the answer. The truth is that they wanted to catch Him in a debate about priorities—which duty ranks highest, which love comes first. Our Lord answers without hesitation, and His answer holds the whole Law and the Prophets together in two sentences that can never be separated and which every Christian should know by heart: “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second resembles it: You must love your neighbour as yourself.”

Notice the order. Notice the force of that word “resemble” (Greek - omoia, from the root “homo”), or in some translations, “like.” The second is not an optional add-on, nor is it a softer version of the first. It resembles the first, it is like the first—because it draws its very life from the first. Any love for neighbour that is not rooted in love for God is no longer the love Jesus commands. It may look generous, it may feel warm, it may even do a great deal of good on the surface—but it is not Gospel love. But one thing is clear - the two parts of the commandment are inseparable, although they sometime seem to pull us in opposite directions.

There is a real tension here, and we must not pretend otherwise. On the one hand, we can become so absorbed in “loving God” or think that we are doing so, that we grow cold toward the people He places in our path—the stranger, the widow, the orphan, the one who inconveniences us. In fact, our Lord tells us that “if we have done this to the least of the brethren, we have done this to Him.” But there is more. The first reading from Exodus is blunt about the consequence of our indifference: the Lord hears the cry of the oppressed, and His anger flares against those who claim to belong to Him while crushing the vulnerable. You cannot love God and treat your neighbour as disposable. Remember what St John tells us: “Anyone who says they love God but hates their brother or sister is a liar” (1 John 4:20).

On the other hand—and this is the subtler danger in our time—we can become so absorbed in “loving neighbour” that God quietly drops out of the picture. We start to think that being a decent person, a helpful person, a socially conscious person is enough. We reduce the second commandment to a programme of social justice or altruism: do good, be kind, make the world better. And we call it Christian love. Loving others becomes purely our effort and ours alone. That is why love can often feel burdensome when it is not reciprocated. This is the problem we see in so many marriages, including those among Catholics. They view the love that they have for each other is purely a commitment they made during the wedding ceremony, not realising that there is a necessary third party to the marriage, One who cements the indissoluble bond between them - it is God. God’s love completes the marriage and brings it to fulfilment.

The second part of the commandment resembles the first precisely because it is an overflow of the first. When the heart is fixed on God—when we love Him with everything we are—then the neighbour is no longer a project or a cause or a way of feeling virtuous about ourselves. The neighbour becomes someone who belongs to the God we love. We see them with His eyes. We serve them with His heart. The love is no longer our own achievement; it is participation in the love that God Himself is.

That is the difference between Gospel love and the altruistic “love” of the do-gooder. The do-gooder acts from a sense of duty, or sympathy, or ideology, or the quiet satisfaction of being useful. All of that can produce real benefits. But it remains horizontal. It does not rise to God, and therefore it does not finally transform the one who gives or the one who receives. It can even become a subtle form of self-worship: I am the one who helps; I am the solution.

Gospel love is different. It begins on its knees. It begins with the confession that we ourselves are the ones who have been loved first—loved when we were strangers, when we were orphans of grace, when we had nothing to offer. Only from that place of having been claimed by God does our love for others become pure. It is no longer about proving our goodness; it is about allowing the goodness of God to pass through us. St Therese spoke of this love which “drove the members of the Church to action, that if this love were extinguished, the apostles would have proclaimed the Gospel no longer, the martyrs would have shed their blood no more”. Without such love, we would be an empty shell.

Saint Paul, writing to the Thessalonians in today’s second reading, shows us what this love looks like in practice. The believers there had received the Gospel “in spite of the great opposition,” and their joy in the Holy Spirit became a living witness. Their love was not a social programme; it was the fruit of having turned from idols to the living God and of waiting for His Son. Their neighbour-love was rooted in God-love, and therefore it had power.

So the tension remains, and it is healthy. If our love of God does not press us outward toward the neighbour, it is incomplete. If our love of neighbour is not continually drawn back into the love of God, it will eventually wither into activism or sentimentality. The two commandments stand together, the second resembles the first, because only when the heart is given wholly to God can it be given freely to others.

Today, then, let us ask for the grace to hold them in the right order. Let us love the Lord our God with everything we are—heart, soul, mind—and from that love, and never apart from it, let us love the neighbour He places before us. That is the whole Law. That is the Gospel. That is the only love that lasts or in the words of St Therese who found her true vocation in love: “that love is everything, that this same love embraces every time and every place. In one word, that love is everlasting.”

Should we be envious of God's generosity?

Twenty-Fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A

Throughout the world, bi-partisan politics in many countries can often be reduced to a contest of will between two economic systems – capitalism and socialism. The capitalist wants to support business growth by reducing taxes and the socialist would like to see a more equitable distribution of wealth by raising taxes for the rich to subsidise the poor. It seems like an easy choice for us Christians. The socialist option sounds pretty Christian. Didn’t Robin Hood steal from the rich to feed the poor? (Unfortunately, Robin Hood is not a Christian model for social justice) Is this what we are seeing in today’s gospel parable? 

 A shallow reading of the parable of the labourers in the vineyard may lead to a conclusion that our Lord was in favour of creating a socialist paradise. Everyone gets paid the same regardless of the work and time put in. Does that make our Lord a socialist? As we would see, our Lord is neither a socialist nor is he a capitalist. He is our Saviour and the salvation He offers is not just confined to having a political system where everyone is treated equally and where we have an economic and wage system that is equitable. In contrast, salvation reflects the abundant mercy of God shown to all, especially “more” for those in need. 

 Most of us would agree that the landowner in the parable is depicted as someone with a skewed idea of justice. For most people, it is intolerable to think that some people are paid much to do quite little, and others are paid quite little to do much. Ultimately, for many, fairness and consistency are the keys– if I work hard and do more than you do at the same job, I should get paid more, and you less. If we get paid the same, conventional wisdom says, I am being punished for doing more and you are rewarded for doing less. That is why communism has not worked out so well in practice. People would have no motivation to put in the extra effort since everyone gets paid the same regardless of the amount of effort, innovation and time put into the project. Hard work is not incentivised. 

It is quite easy to translate such thoughts and feelings to the spiritual realm. Many would like to think that there are levels of reward in eternity. Those who have done more should be more greatly rewarded, right? And those who do less should receive less, right? And yet our Lord overthrows this line of logic, just as He does with so many other expectations that humans have based upon how the world works. As the prophet Isaiah reminds us in the first reading that God’s thoughts are not your thoughts, and His ways are not your ways, as “the heavens are as high above the earth.” 

The logic of the Kingdom is found in the last line of today’s passage, “the last will be first, and the first, last.” This connects the parable with what came before– the story of the rich young man who wanted to do “more” to gain eternal life and our Lord challenged him to give up everything and follow Him. An incredible demand and a seemingly impossible feat! But our Lord then tells His disciples that such sacrifice which seems impossible with man is possible with God, and that those who follow Him will receive a hundredfold blessing and inherit eternal life. In choosing to become poor for the Kingdom, one actually becomes rich. 

This logic is illustrated in today’s parable. The sense of the story is easy to understand. Every single worker got the same pay - a denarius, the average day’s wage for a labourer - even though they all put in different hours of work and labour. It is no wonder that the first set of workers would grumble. They expected to be paid more for putting in more hours of work. 

Now comes the paradigm shift. The landowner declares that he has done them no wrong. In fact, he has done what he had promised - everyone had been promised a denarius and everyone, including the original labourers, had agreed to this amount. At the end of the day, the landowner has the prerogative to determine the amount to be paid out and if he wants to be generous toward those who worked less, who can tell him that he is wrong for doing so? At the end of the story, the landowner asked this question: “why be envious when I am generous?” The landowner is not on trial for being unjust. He is actually being generous. In fact, it is the workers who are on trial for being envious when they could have chosen to be more charitable. 

So, although socialists may rejoice over this parable by viewing it through their ideological lenses, the parable is both a critique of capitalism as well as socialism. To those who wish to view this story through the lenses of capitalism, the parable is a reminder that salvation offered by God is never based on our individual merit but dependent on the generosity of God’s Providence. To the socialist, the parable exposes what Winston Churchill had to say about socialism, “Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy.” The original group of labourers could not recognise the generosity and goodness of the landowner shown to the latecomers. They were just envious of their co-workers “good fortune.” 

The parable is clearly an allegory. The landowner of the vineyard is God. The vineyard is the Kingdom. The marketplace represents the world, and those in it waiting for work are those seeking truth which leads to salvation. Those entering the vineyard are those who respond to His call. Some begin serving the Lord from an early age, working many years in the Kingdom, and God has promised them the hundredfold inheritance and eternal life. Others enter at various stages of life. Some might even come to the faith at the end of their lives. But God does not discriminate. For anyone who heeds His call, no matter how late in life, God offers His gift of eternal life. Are we to begrudge Him for this benevolent gift shown even to the sinner who repents on his deathbed as he draws his final breath? This should be a cause for great rejoicing instead of complaining and grumbling. What greater joy can there be knowing that a sinner has repented, a soul has been saved? 

Salvation being offered to all is not a sign of disrespect to those who are early in the game or who put in more effort than others, but a reflexion of the magnanimity and generosity of God. This logic is offensive to the world but ought to be a source of joy to those in the Kingdom. It is not designed to damper our spiritual growth. It should not lead anyone to assume that they can just sneak into heaven without diligently seeking to serve God. Quite the contrary, this message is hope for the world. It does not matter whether you enter His vineyard at 9am or 5pm– the important thing is that you enter His vineyard, and once you are in it, to work diligently to serve the Master! Once you are in the vineyard, there is no time to laze around. 

Salvation can be had at any age– because salvation, ultimately, is more about what God has done for us and not about what we deserve - what we have done. Those who worked for a long time and those who worked for a short time will both receive it. Instead of making unhealthy comparisons and projecting our envy on the blessings others are receiving, let us praise God for the opportunity for salvation and eternal life, and let us all be active in His vineyard!