To Love Without
Exception
In today’s
gospel, we see a young man approach Jesus and ask a really important question:
“What must I do to inherit eternal life?” This is a great question. Jesus
responds by saying we must keep the commandments. But instead of citing all of
the commandments, Jesus only quotes the second tablet—the tablet that has to do
with love of neighbor. The young man says he has followed all of these. At
which point, Jesus says that the man is “lacking in one thing.” What is that
one thing? It is the first tablet.
The first
tablet of the commandments is about love of God: Have no other gods besides me;
do not take the Lord’s name in vain; keep holy the Sabbath day. This is what
the man lacks: the first tablet: love of God from a heart that is oriented
entirely to the Lord. This is why Jesus says, “go, sell what you have…” Until
the man does this, his heart will be divided. Jesus doesn’t want the bare
minimum; Jesus wants us to strive for love without exception. And so, Jesus
wants the man to sell everything, selling which then will create a void, a void
that can then be filled with God, so that the man can follow God without
exception.
What are we
attached to in our lives? What keeps us from loving God without exception?
Sure, we may keep the commandments, but is it from a heart oriented entirely to
the Lord? We may do well in fulfilling the second tablet—love of neighbor—but
God wants that love to flow from the first tablet: love of God. Without love of
God, our love of neighbor comes to little. If we have exceptions when it comes
to our love of God, our love for neighbor will quickly falter.
A Historical Moment:
An Occasion for Fidelity
On
Thursday, the universal Church celebrated the opening of the Year of Faith, a
year in which we are invited to examine the Church’s teachings and to grow
deeper in love with the God who comes to meet us. Pope Benedict XVI called this
Year of Faith to open on two important anniversaries: the 50th
anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council and the 20th
anniversary of the publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The
Council and the Catechism are thus two very important pieces of our faith that
we must take time this year to study so that we can become more and more
faithful.
There was
another historical event that happened on Thursday: we saw for the first time
two Catholic politicians in a debate for the Vice-Presidency. Ordinarily, I
would not bring up their debate in a homily, but in their debate they discussed
the Catholic faith. I will start with Paul Ryan.
Paul Ryan
Paul Ryan
said that he believes that the baby in the womb is, in fact, a baby. Thanks be
to God. But then he said that he would follow the Romney policy that “in the
rare cases of rape and incest” abortion would be acceptable. Now, I cannot
speak from personal experience about the horrors of rape and incest. But I am
certain, very certain, that rape and incest is horrible. Absolutely horrible.
And I completely understand where he is coming from: sure, maybe he wants
votes; but I am sure that he is more concerned about being merciful to the
woman who has experienced such a horrific crime.
But do
these things change the reality that there is a baby in the womb? Does the
circumstance in which a life is conceived change the nature of the life
conceived? A baby is a baby no matter how. And it is never permissible, never
allowed, to kill a baby. A baby is a baby and it must never be
killed—especially in the womb. No exception.
Paul Ryan, then, is “lacking one
thing.” He needs to go and sell what he has and have a heart undivided to God.
Perhaps God will do something for that woman; perhaps God has plans for that
child. We cannot ever call murder “mercy.”
I wish he
would sell that attachment. I weep for him.
Joe Biden
Joe Biden
also calls himself a good Catholic. And he too says that an unborn baby is
human. Thanks be to God. But his position is worse than Ryan’s. Whereas Ryan
was motivated out of a false sense of mercy, Biden simply says that he “will
not impose my morality on others.” At first hearing, this may sound attractive,
because it seems to uphold free will. But let’s take that for a spin. When we
say that it is a crime to defraud money from others, haven’t we imposed a
morality on others? When we say that it is a crime to kill another in cold
blood, haven’t we imposed a morality on others? Shoot, even when we put up a
stop sign, haven’t we imposed a morality: namely, that it is good to stop and
bad to plough through an intersection? Every law is an imposition of morality!
This means
that when Biden says that he will not impose his morality on others, he already has! He already has imposed
his morality. And what is his morality? Relativism; that while others kill a baby in the
womb, we can say and do nothing, because that's their reality. Shame! One the one hand Biden imposes the morality of charity to the poor, but then he won't impose the morality of charity to the unborn child? How can he hold this foolishness?
Well, it is because his belief, that the baby in the womb is human, is not—in
his mind—a universal. If you don’t believe it’s a baby, then it’s not a baby.
But that’s
crazy. Not only does this go against God and science and reason, but against
fundamental notions of reality itself. We do not define reality and morality. To define our own morality goes contrary to the reality of the commandments: that God defines morality. Thus, Biden
simply doesn’t undermine the commandment “thou shall not kill,” but he undermines
the commandments' very existence.
Biden, more
than Ryan, is called to a greater selling. I pray for him.
Mother Theresa: Love
of Neighbor Predicated Upon Love of God – First Tablet Before the Second
This has
devastating consequences for social policy. For now, I will simply say this:
both vice presidential candidate’s social policy seems, at first glance, to
fall within the confines of allowable policy under Catholic social teaching.
Catholic social teaching allows a wide umbrella of acceptable governmental and
economic structure. Some argue that Biden’s social policy is more faithful to
Catholic teaching than Ryan’s.
But let me
comment on the fundamental difference in their social policy:
“By abortion, the mother does not learn to
love, but kills even her own child to solve her problems. And, by abortion,
that father is told that he does not have to take any responsibility at all for
the child he has brought into the world. The father is likely to put other
women into the same trouble. So abortion just leads to more abortion. Any
country that accepts abortion is not teaching its people to love, but to use
any violence to get what they want. This is why the greatest destroyer of love
and peace is abortion.”
This was said by Mother Theresa. You see, while it is true
that taking care of the poor is an essential facet of our faith—love of man is
the second tablet—our preferential option for the poor is undermined when a
social policy holds to or advances abortion. While it is true that oppression
of the poor falls under intrinsic evil, doing good—like the commandments—are
ordered hierarchically. If we undermine life itself in its most vulnerable
state, then it doesn’t matter what we do socially. That is Catholic teaching,
and Mother Theresa, the saint of the poor, echoed that sentiment. Do you wish
to argue with her?
Called to be Catholic: Wise and Faithful
It pains me
that both republicans and democrats—both who claim to be stewards of the poor
and vulnerable—have never put an end to abortion. They are “lacking in one
thing.”
Objectively,
I tell you all of this not so that I can convince you to vote for one candidate
or another. I am not a Democrat, I am not a Republican. I am a Catholic. Since
the Second Vatican Council, I know there has been delineations of Catholics
into “liberal” and “conservative.” And I hate those categories because they are
ultimately political. We are called to be faithful—and
that is the category by which we will be judged. Judgment requires wisdom,
which is mentioned in our first reading. It takes wisdom to cut through the emotions
and political affiliations that we are attached to. It takes wisdom to see that
if we truly wish to serve the poor, we must first serve life. It takes wisdom
to judge that political policies of two candidates differ not only in their
political orientation, but in fidelity to God.
When it comes to fidelity on the
first social issue that grounds all other social issues, we can judge Catholic
candidates’ fidelity. We must judge
this, for our own eternal life depends on it.
“What must I do to inherit eternal
life?” Jesus responds: “Go, sell what you have… and come, follow me.”
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