This thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time of Year A gathers a law for the stranger, a church marked by joy in tribulation and a question put to Jesus as a test. Our difficulty is a love divided between what we owe to God and what we owe to our neighbour, as if one could wait until it is convenient. The readings lead us from Exodus to Thessalonica and then to the greatest commandment.
But the Pharisees, hearing that he had caused the Sadducees to be silent, came together as one. And one of them, a doctor of the law, questioned him, to test him: "Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?" Jesus said to him: "'You shall love the Lord your God from all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the greatest and first commandment. But the second is similar to it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments the entire law depends, and also the prophets." (Mt 22:34-40)
The first reading, taken from the book of Exodus, begins with a stranger standing outside. The Lord forbids Israel to harass the newcomer, and he gives a reason that rests on memory: "For you yourselves were once newcomers in the land of Egypt" (Ex 22:21). The law therefore asks for more than kindness: it asks for recognition. Israel is asked not to afflict the newcomer because it has itself been a newcomer in Egypt.
The same passage names the widow, the orphan and the poor man whose garment is pledged, and it orders that the garment be returned before sunset: it is all that he has to cover himself. But the Lord does not stop at the command. He adds, "If he cries out to me, I will hear him, because I am compassionate" (Ex 22:27). The law of Israel thus rests on God himself, who answers the cry of the poor because he is compassionate.
"I will love you, O Lord my strength" (Ps 17:2): David, the psalmist, opens the psalm with a love that is already an answer. The Lord was first his refuge and his liberator. God loves before we do, and our love is the echo of a rescue already received.
Paul, the apostle, writes to the church of the Thessalonians, and he shows what such a love produces: they accepted the Word "in the midst of great tribulation, but with the joy of the Holy Spirit" (1 Th 1:6). Their joy came from the Holy Spirit who already dwelt in them, and it made them a pattern for all who believe in Macedonia and in Achaia.
A doctor of the law puts Jesus to the test and asks which commandment is the great one. Behind the test lies an old search, for the teachers of Israel counted 613 commandments in the Law and looked for the one that could gather them all. But observing a list is not yet loving, and Jesus leads the doctor back to the source.
Jesus does not pick one commandment out of the list. He names the source of all the others: "You shall love the Lord your God from all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind" (Mt 22:37). Such a love claims the whole person, because it answers a love that came first. The second, to love the neighbour as oneself, is similar to it, and so "On these two commandments the entire law depends, and also the prophets" (Mt 22:40). The law is not abolished, but unveiled as an inner key. This double love is the whole of the Christian life, never a pleasant extra.
So the law of Exodus and the answer of Jesus meet. Exodus already speaks of the neighbour whose garment is held in pledge, and the God who hears their cry is the Lord we are to love with all our heart. And yet love of the neighbour is the sequel to love of God, and cut off from it, it runs dry, like a spring severed from its source. Love is no calculation and no code of conduct: it is a vital necessity, the fire of a heart that God has renewed from within.
In the spirituality of Bethlehem, the welcome we give to the stranger recalls the Lord himself, who came into a world that had no room for him and became small in order to be received. From the threshold of the manger he asks for the place we make for the newcomer. That is why the love of the neighbour begins with opening a place, however small, to the one at the threshold.
Today we are invited to open our hearts to God and to our neighbour as one love, which no longer waits for comfort or convenience. It is not a duty added to faith, but faith turned outward, in our households, our workplaces and our parishes. So let us keep a place at our door for the stranger, and rely on the God who hears the cry of the poor.
Scripture text: Catholic Public Domain Version (CPDV), public domain.
Prayer of the Day
Lord Jesus, Child of Bethlehem, you came into a world that had no room for you, and you made yourself small so that we might draw near. Teach us to love your Father with all our heart and to open our door to the stranger. Make our love an answer to your love and not a duty, and let no one stand uncovered at our threshold. Amen.
For Meditation
- Is our love for God and neighbour a priority that shapes our days, or an occasional gesture that waits for comfort and convenience?
- Whom do we still treat as a newcomer, and what would change if we remembered that we too once stood outside?
- Where have we received the love of God that came first, and how does it already reach the people at our door?
