SEVENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (2025)

SEVENTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME (2025)

Readings:

1 Samuel  26:2, 7-9, 12-13, 22-23

Psalms 103:1-13

1 Corinthians 15:45-49

Luke 6:27-38

To be perfectly honest, I loved the Vice President’s faulty interpretation of the ancient theological concept of ordo amoris.  Mr. Vance was using his interpretation of the concept to bolster the President’s plan to deport thousands of immigrants, on account of their so-called threat to the nation: “You love your family, then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country.  And then after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world.”  Now that is a ‘loving plan’ that I could easily accept, especially if I could stop, let’s say, after the first part, and be self-satisfied that I was doing the best I could to love.  I’m blessed to have a family that I genuinely love (some would have trouble with this part, but they could just pick and choose who to love next), but I might have some difficulty with the neighbor part, especially neighbors who threaten to kill me!  So I move on to the next part, and discover that I have not had the opportunity to say anything good about the citizens of my country involved in the January 6 insurrection.  I could just move on to the last part, but Mr. Vance has not done much to tell me how to prioritize the remaining world – is it done by whether I like the food of that region, whether they field a winning Olympic team, or have a bustling economy?

Pope Francis, in a rare entry into American politics, denounced Vance in a letter to the U.S. bishops: “Christian love is not a concentric expansion of interests that little by little extend to other persons and groups.”  No, let’s face it, the Christian call to love is much more difficult and challenging, and if your definition of love is too easy, then it probably has little to do with the love that is asked of us by Jesus, as the readings from today’s liturgy demonstrate.

The first reading once again shows that extraordinary love and respect was not something invented by Jesus.  However, Jesus did broaden the concept of love to include all people, regardless of their relationship to us.  You will recall that at one time in the Book of Samuel, Saul and David were the best of friends.  But Saul’s suspicious nature and inferiority complex came to view David as the enemy, someone who ought to be killed.  In spite of Saul seeking to take David’s life, David chooses the higher road, and chooses not to lay a hand on “the Lord’s anointed,” even though God has delivered Saul’s life into his hands.  Our first reading functions as a parable, and David is the one who models the “kindness and compassion” spoken of in the responsorial psalm.  The refrain of the psalm prefigures what Jesus will say in the gospel, and what those who follow Jesus are called to be.

Truly, what might my bishop be thinking when he reads the words of this gospel?  Is he more inclined to act justly, stop judging, and stop condemning?  I think there is nine years of evidence that even those who proclaim to be holy are capable of not heeding what the Lord Himself has taught us.  Loving as Jesus would have us love is dauntingly difficult, and to underestimate its difficulty is to water down the striking message of Jesus: “love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.”  How often have I tried to challenge myself with the words of Jesus, praying that they keep me from the dangerous precipice of hate!  As Paul tells us in the second reading, “Just as we have borne the image of the earthly one (Jesus), we are [called to] bear the image of the heavenly one (Jesus).”  With all of the difficulty that it entails, may we strive to love all people with the love that reflects that of Jesus.  No lesser love is worth striving for.