Saturday, February 24, 2024
Dt 26:16-19; Mt 5:43-48
Today’s Gospel highlights Christian love in its authentic form.
The agapeic love that Jesus demands of his followers indicates unconquerable benevolence and invincible goodwill.
It requires an intentional determination to love and have only love as our identity, come what may.
It is this radicality that intimidates us, and we look for excuses and justifications for failure.
Why would Jesus require of us such love in absolute terms, if it is ‘almost’ impossible or not considered possible ‘always’?
Here is where Jesus reveals his incarnational agenda. Jesus took on our human nature so that we would participate in his Divinity. He came down to us to raise us all to Him.
What facilitates such moving up is our capacity for such radical love toward those we hate, even for the right reasons.
To enable our understanding, Jesus invokes the examples of sun and rain that indiscriminately benefit everyone, good and bad alike. As sources of all life, rain and sun also symbolize the continuation of God’s love for all.
Having been created in God’s image and likeness, the only way to ascend to God is to become like Him.
Jesus was perfect, like his Heavenly Father, when he expressed his love on the cross.
Then, the demand for us is to walk behind our Master to reach his perfection!
Fr. Dhinakaran Savariyar
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