The greatest commandment – it is found in the OT, it is the basis for the Shema – that prayer that pious Jew prayed at least twice every day - upon rising in the morning, and going to bed in the evening -
The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.
But why? What do I owe to God? Why should I? - Perhaps this is an easy question – After all we are completely dependent on God. Everything one may have all comes from God – Our existence comes from God – he created us – It is only by God that we continue to exist – It is God who has called us to eternal life with him in heaven – It is God who forgives us our sins - It is God who has saved us – Christ by his passion death and resurrection – We are always dependent on God – and we are grateful to God for this.
Fulfilling this great commandment starts with gratitude – gratitude for all God did, and still does for us.
St Ignatius of Loyola wrote that "ingratitude is the cause, beginning, and origin of all sins and misfortunes.” This makes sense – One will not love what one is not grateful for – St Ignatius continues “On the contrary, the grateful acknowledgment of blessings and gifts received is loved and esteemed not only on earth but in heaven."
And it is in this gratitude that we love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength.
But is, for many, this is the easy part to understand --- doing is a different story --- Jesus does not end with the beginning of the Shema - He continues with You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
It is not just God we are dependent on, but neighbor, the broad sense of neighbor that one thinks of when thinking of the Good Samaritan – for no one is just an individual I – but always part of a We.
We are most obviously dependent on our parents – No one is born without them in at least some way – We are dependent on those who fed us in infancy – anyone what has been around infants will say just how dependent an infant is. But this dependency continues - to what one learns about virtue and how one is to live – how to treat others – what does it mean to be a man or women? These are things that one learns from a community.
The necessity of community and being part more than just an “I” does not end as one gets older - A business owner, who “works for himself” depends on a community – there is no business if there are no customers. He needs clients.
Just as, in recognition of our dependance on God, we must be grateful – so also with our neighbor – we must love others in response to our gratitude – but these examples leave out something of our dependance - one community on which we are dependent on – it is only in community which one must have gratitude for that community where one truly fulfils the commandment to love God with one’s whole heart, soul, mind, and strength – It is only in and with the Church.
It is only from the Church that we have our faith, which has guarded and handed it down to us. It is the Church, with her sacraments, through which sins are forgiven, and one becomes a child of God – Through the sacraments of the Church which one receives the Holy Spirit - It is the church through who, in the Mass, Christ is present in the Eucharist – present body, blood, soul, and divinity – the Mass which is the source and summit of the Christian life.
The Mass –is also called the Eucharist and Eucharist literally means – “to give thanks” These two great commandments – love God and love neighbor -it turns out, are one – in order to have gratitude to God and to love him as we ought, we must be in the community, the church – And in the sacrifice of the Mass we offer all back to God, all that he has given us – given back in gratitude. – There may be sinners in the Church – after all We are all here, but do we have gratitude for the Church? Not just the Church in the abstract, but for her members, those members of the Body of Christ?
Monday is the Solemnity of All Saints – Tuesday the Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed. These two days set aside by the Church for those who have gone before us – On November 1st remembering and calling on the intercession of those saints in heaven who have gone before us, and then on the 2nd praying for those faithful in purgatory. These are those who passed on the faith to us through the generations – those who celebrated the sacraments before us – These are some to whom we must be grateful – and it is on these days that we remember them in gratitude. Gratitude to them, to the Church, and to God. This gratitude was seen during the procession to the Cemetery on Wednesday – a procession to pray for those faithful gone before us. In what ways can we be grateful?
And if one has gratitude, both to God and to neighbor, then truly - they are not far from the kingdom of God.