Dear Parish Family,

Americans like things summed up easily and in few words. We like short news bytes and easy to understand directions that pop up on our phones. Simple, quick, and easy are words we live by. At first glance, today’s Gospel from Matthew offers such a summary for today’s Catholic, “Love God and neighbor.” Jesus responded to the lawyer’s question with two quotations from the Torah. The first quotation came from the Sacred Jewish Prayer called the Shema Israel.  This was a prayer contained in the sixth chapter of the Book of Deuteronomy 6:5 and recited by pious Jews every morning and evening, "Hear this, O Israel, Shema Israel, God is One.  You shall love your God with your whole heart, your whole soul and your whole mind."  The second quotation came from the Book of Leviticus, 19:18, "You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” We can't just love God part time, we have to love Him with everything we have.  We can't just be good to our neighbor sometimes, we have to be good to others always. This was not the easy answer the lawyer was seeking.  Jesus’ answer was not a particular law, not even two particular laws.  His answer demanded a new lifestyle, a way of living that draws us so close to God that we become His presence for others. 

Dorothy Day lived most of the last century from 1893 to 1980 and is sometimes called the saint of the third millennium.  Dorothy did not begin her adult life as a holy person. She embraced the loose lifestyle of the Roaring Twenties and what was then the wild scene in Greenwich Village in New York City. She was no Mother Theresa type and in fact, she was the antithesis of Mother Theresa. But then Dorothy found God.  Actually, He was always there.  She just stopped shutting him out of her life. She became a fervent Catholic, a dedicated Christian. She led a reform within the establish Church of America to reach out to the poor, the needy and the desperate.  She was a crusader for social justice, a pacifist and even an agitator, at least in those areas where she saw the local and national government existing only for itself. 

There is talk Dorothy Day should be canonized, made a saint.  She would have been completely repulsed by that thought.  In fact, even during her life when people suggested that she would be made a saint by the church, she would say that she didn’t want to be dismissed so easily.  After all, people tend to view saints as doing that which is beyond normal human life.  She was really quite normal.  She wanted normal people to join her in finding Christ in others.  Her point was that there was nothing extraordinary in doing what she did.  All she did was love God and love neighbor, and live the way every Christian should live.  Still, she probably won’t get her way. Pope Francis would love to tell her story to the whole world, as he did when he came to the US and addressed the Congress.
The requirement to love God and neighbor can be likened to the backdrop of a theatrical production. The backdrop gives form and context to what is happening in the front of the stage, namely, the actors performing the play. Loving God completely with all of one’s being and the admonition to love one’s neighbor, the backdrop of the Christian life, will help the person make daily decisions that are in accord with God’s law. In making those decisions, the faithful follower of Christ refers back to “loving God and neighbor” and uses that teaching as his guide. Which commandment is the greatest?  “Don’t search scripture for a particular commandment,” Jesus responds. Instead combine the Shema Israel, “Love the Lord with your whole mind, your whole heart and your whole soul,” with the law of love in Leviticus, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” This is a lifestyle, not a commandment. We pray today that we might love God so deeply that we will have no choice but to bring God’s love to those around us.

Fr. Tom Kunnel C.O.