Love of God, Love of Self, and Love of Neighbor: Reactive and Proactive, Receptive and Responsive

In the Gospel for Mass two Sundays ago, Jesus issues his most poignant and succinct teaching about how humans are to live in the world: "You shall 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 is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself." Since everything in the Christian and truly human life hinges on love of God, love of self, and love of neighbor, it would be worthwhile to ponder what this "looks like" in the concrete. One way of approaching the "greatest commandment" of total love for God, self, and other, is to think of this love as an energy that is "reactive and proactive"and "receptive and responsive." 


When one thinks of the word, "reactive", one usually doesn't arrive at a positive valuing of the term. To be "reactive" can cannote being impetuous, impulsive, and "reactionary." However, this word can also refer to equally positive behaviors, especially when connected with the Great Commandment of love. When a person is reactive according to this commandment, they respond relatively easily and immediately to the needs and dignity of other persons. An example would be if someone were to buy lunch for a homeless person standing on the side of the road. To love "reactively" means being open and ready to meet the needs of others. Another way of fulfilling the Great Commandment is by loving "proactively." According to the Judeo-Christian tradition, it isn't enough to simply wait until someone in need comes across one's path; rather, the "bar of loving" is set at the height of looking, and even searching, for those in need of love. A number of stories told by Jesus in the New Testament depict God as a restless searcher for the lost, the lonely, and the needy. Chapter 15 of Luke's Gospel offers dramatic examples of how love at it's height is not only about reacting to the needs of others but proactively searching for the needy other. In a society that has gone to great lengths to create suburban enclaves of safety, security, and a facade of total well-being, searching for the needy other is absolutely imperative, especially since the truly desperate will rarely cross our paths while "holed up" in such places.  


The great command to love can also be approached in terms of being "receptive and responsive." To be receptive implies an openness toward all, especially those who are in greatest need. To revert back to the example of the homeless person standing on the side of the road, it means withholding judgement and allowing ourselves to be moved with pity and compassion. Receptivity, in it's greatest expression, is really about hospitality: setting a long and wide table within ourselves for the divine mystery and sacred story which is at the heart of every person and creature who graces the face of the earth. As important as it is to be receptive to others in fulfilling the great command to love, hospitality only deepens in it's richness and beauty when we have an abiding awareness of those in need of our service.  Just as it is necessary to not only be reactive but proactive in one's loving disposition toward God, self, and others, so it is essential that we not only provide hospitality but extend it through a responsiveness that reaches out to others both near and far. To be truly responsive requires an attentiveness to the heartbrokenness of the world. However, what makes such responsiveness exceedingly difficult in our society is our obsession with being entertained. Karl Marx once said that "religion is the opium of the masses." Today we might revise this by saying, "entertainment is the opium of the masses." To allow one's self to be entertained to the point of distraction deadens the capacity for sharing in, and responding to, the broken heartedness and struggle that is representative of the vast majority of the world's population. 


The great command to love can be approached and understood in various ways. However it is approached and understood, to be truly effective in our lives it must be appropriated in as practical a manner as possible. We practically appropriate the command to love God, ourselves, and neighbor, when we form dispositions and attitudes that are reactive, proactive, receptive, and responsive to the world around us, especially that large swath of the world that is broken, needy, and crying out for justice.

29th Sunday in Ordinary Time: "Making Room for Room"

There has been much talk in our contemporary U.S. society about the presence of God in daily life and how Christians are called to bear witness to it. "God talk" and public testimonials about people's relationship with God have become relatively commonplace, frequently arising in the U.S. sports and political arenas. Just this past weekend I heard a college football coach give thanks to God (after a victory, of course) for being blessed to be a part of his particular program. Last week a Republican party front runner for the presidential nomination and Baptist minister spoke of the need to "make room for the Holy Spirit." All of this very public God talk begs the question of God's presence in our lives and world and how to witness to it in a way that is God honoring (meaning, in a way that draws others to God rather then repel them).


The first reading and Gospel for the 29th Sunday in Ordinary Time reflect different attitudes about God's involvement with the world and how we give honor and glory to God. The first reading is quite fascinating, and, even astounding because it states that God favored a pagan, Cyrus, King of Persia. The reading from Isaiah goes so far as to state that God is the one who has manipulated circumstances to ensure that Cyrus would prevail over his enemies. The attitude conveyed by Isaiah is that God is the one directly responsible for all that unfolds in history, to include military conquest and domination. In the Gospel, Jesus has a different take then Isaiah, seemingly contrasting "secular" powers with the power of God by stating, "give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God." So, which reading is correct? The first, or the second? Is God directly responsible for all that unfolds in history as Isaiah asserts, or, are there two "parallel" realities as seemingly suggested by Jesus?

This dilemma is perhaps irresolvable. There is no way of knowing for sure precisely how God is involved in the processes of the world or human affairs. It is fair to say, however, that our modern day approach to Christian theology asserts unequivocally that God is not a God who backs the powerful and ruthless but has sided with the poor, the vulnerable, and the defenseless. However, the more pressing and important question that is presented by this weekend's readings is: what exactly "belongs" to God? What belongs to God is space.


In his classic book, "Man's Search for Meaning", the famous psychologist Victor Frankl relates the following account of what he did soon after his release from Auschwitz: "One day, a few days after the liberation, I walked through the country past flowering meadows, for miles and miles, toward the market town near the camp. Larks rose to the sky and I could hear their joyous song. There was no one to be seen for miles around; there was nothing but the wide earth and sky and the larks' jubilation and the freedom of space. At that moment there was very little I knew of myself or of the world - I had but one sentence in mind - always the same: "I called to the Lord in my narrow prison and he answered me in the freedom of space."


The God of Jesus Christ is almost certainly a God of tremendous spaciousness. When we think of one of the characteristics that defines God par excellence, it is the spaciousness of God: space between Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, to be themselves and to carry out their respective roles in history. Space between God and creation: so that creation can grow and flourish in and for itself. And, finally, space between God and the human person: so that humanity can find its way in history and grow in the image and likeness of God. Far from something ostentatious such as public testimony, we give to God what belongs to God when we simply give to God the same thing that God gives us: space.

The Vineyard of the World and Our Very Lives

Last week I attended a conference on professional guardianship that was chock full of useful information about this practice by experts from fields that spanned the spectrum from geriatrics to animal hoarding. As relevant and insightful as the presentations were, they were all bested by the final keynote talk given by two diminutive nuns who spoke about the importance of self-regard, self-care, and self-love in seeking to provide guardianship services to persons who are truly vulnerable and at the mercy of their caregivers. After the hour-and-a-half talk which included a number of practical exercises and a great deal of laughter, one could perceive a palpable, positive energy coursing through the room - it was truly a great way to end the conference.


The metaphor that the nuns wrapped their talk around was the notion of having a positive, loving impact on one's little corner of "the vineyard." This is a scriptural metaphor that can be found in both the Old and New Testaments. The readings for the 27th Sunday in Ordinary Time (two weekends ago) actually focus on this metaphor. What is interesting about the metaphor is that it refers to both a place (Mt. 21:33-43) and a people (Isaiah 5:1-7). In other words, the Lord's vineyard is both the world in which we work and live and our very selves. We are not only called by God to cultivate, tend, and transform the world but to be cultivated, tended, and transformed as a part of the world. We are not mere laborers working on a project but equally a project that is labored upon.


The value of suggesting that our lives are akin to a vineyard and project that is being cultivated by God is that it can help us to approach all the events of our lives in a spirit of hope - especially the challenging ones. Just as a grape endures the intensity of the sun in order to mature and ripen, so our lives mature, ripen, and deepen when we allow them to be exposed to all that life has to offer. If one reflects on the events of ones life that led to growth, maturation, and depth, it is likely the case that the events were intense, difficult, challenging, or, perhaps, even painful. When we grow in the awareness that we are not mere laborers in the vineyard but a part of the vineyard itself, we needn't shy or back away from the intense, challenging, or even daunting aspects of life: it is precisely such conditions that will lead to the full-maturation of our lives and produce a vintage of unequaled beauty, depth, and richness.