Two priests, the pastor and the assistant pastor, stood holding signs at a sharp curve on a busy road. The pastor’s sign said, “The end is near!” while the assistant pastor’s warned, “Turn around before it’s too late!”
A jerk in a sports car passed by and yelled “Idiots” before raising one finger in what we can’t call a sign of peace and stomping on the gas. Moments later the priests heard the sound of screeching tires, followed by a big splash.
One priest turned to the other and said, “Maybe we should change our signs to ‘Bridge Out’.”
Let’s face it, there a lot of folks who don’t like the Church telling them what direction to take.
But there’s no room for this in our Catholic tradition. Faith—what we believe—and morality—how we act—can’t be separated.
We see this throughout the Bible, but never more clearly than in the teaching of Jesus. The Church has listened to that teaching for two thousand years, developing it and applying it under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
So how do we get to know that teaching? Well, almost anything we study begins with fundamentals before we get specific. In the first year of medicine, future doctors don’t learn surgery but fundamentals. Before that, most students studied science as undergraduates to obtain the necessary knowledge of chemistry, biology and so on.
The same is true of the moral life. To understand and apply all the moral teachings of the Catholic Church—teachings that cover everything from the environment to human sexuality to business practices—you need to start with the fundamentals.
And today, the Lord gives us the two most important of them. He tells us that love of God comes before all else. And that close behind it comes love of neighbour.
Every other teaching of Christ and his Church rests on these foundations. Nothing that is opposed to love of God, nothing that fails to love our brothers and sisters, will ever be right for a Christian.
Yet it won’t always feel right, especially if we haven’t learned the basics of Christian moral theology. Sometimes we will feel that love of God conflicts with love of others.
But that can’t be true, since God does not contradict himself, and two rules cannot contradict themselves and both be true.
Just as mutually exclusive is the idea that what God wants of us and what our neighbour needs from us are opposed to each other.
If your son or daughter asks you for money so he or she can live with a girlfriend or boyfriend, it may feel more loving to reach for your chequebook as you sigh “oh, you young people.”
Speaking the truth will likely be a lot less pleasant. But speaking the truth in love, as St. Paul calls us to do in his Letter to the Ephesians, is what disciples who love God and want to love others must do.
Both the first commandment, the law of love, and the second, to love our neighbour as ourself, may require taking the harder moral road—because the neighbour, in this case the young adult child, needs the truth and deserves the truth. A shortcut from the moral road does not lead to the path of life.
Traditional Catholic moral theology has taken a beating since the 1960s, right alongside many other things on which society used to agree. Amid such confusion, it can be hard to sort right from wrong.
And yet these two great
commandments provide infallible guidance—if you take them together. Loving God
is the clearly the first and most important commandment, but it can’t be
separated from loving others, and vice-versa.
In his first letter, St. John tells us all we need to know about how these two commandments are linked. He writes: “we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.”
It’s easy to miss that point about obedience if we confuse love—whether for God or others—with feelings. St. John repeats himself in the very next verse “the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments.”
Loving the Lord with all our hearts and minds means doing what he asks. And loving others as ourselves means wanting them to love God as we do—which means helping them to obey his commandments.
We can certainly do things our way instead. But if we ignore God’s direction signs, we may very well end up… in the ditch.
A final thought before I close: When Jesus tells us to love one another, we tend to think about serving others, helping the poor, and so on. Yet we also love others by praying for them.
In the next two weeks we’ll be focusing on loving God and others through prayer. November is the month of prayer for the Holy Souls; what is more loving than to pray that the faithful departed, especially our friends and family, receive the fulness of life in the Lord?
The best way to do this is by coming to Mass on All Soul’s Day, Monday November 2, if you are able. There will be one Mass at 7, but we will add another if it fills. You must register online or by phone.
And there’s another way to pray—we’re offering an online book of remembrance. You can add the names of loved ones and so the whole community will remember those inscribed in the book at every Mass during November.
Catholics, of course, have a long tradition of praying for the dead. But we can and should pray also for the living. The parish is launching a prayer ministry in the coming weeks that will help you to receive prayers for your intentions or for you personally.
You’ll be able to make your confidential prayer requests online, and if you wish we will connect you to members of the parish prayer ministry who will pray with you by ZOOM or over the phone. A dedicated member of the prayer team is available to pray with and for the dying, even at their bedside when it’s possible.
We’ll be telling you more about this by Flocknote and in the bulletin, so please stand by.
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