Leviticus
19: 1-2, 15-18 (Charley)
God
spoke to Moses, saying: “Speak to all the congregation of the people of
Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the Holy One your God am holy.
You shall not render an unjust judgment; you shall not be partial to the poor
or defer to the great: with justice you shall judge your neighbour. You shall not go around as a slanderer
among your people, and you shall not profit by the blood of your neighbour: I
am the Holy One. You shall not hate in your heart anyone of your kin; you shall
reprove your neighbour, or you will incur guilt yourself. You shall not take
vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your
neighbour as yourself: I am God.”
Matthew 22:34-46
When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had
silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them, a lawyer,
asked him a question to test him. “Teacher, which commandment in the law is the
greatest?” He said to him, “’You shall love the Lord your God with all your
heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest
and first commandment. And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbour
as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”
***
Will you pray with me? God of all times
and places and nations, open our hearts and minds to your truth today; give us
understanding and wisdom, not to be merely hearers of your truth, but to be
doers of your will. In all your names, amen.
Love. What is love? That’s a question
humans have been trying to answer ever since humans were able to ask
questions. Another question—how do we
love our neighbours, and who, exactly, is our neighbour? And the biggest
question if all, perhaps: what does it mean to love God?
I can’t promise to answer all of these
to your satisfaction, or to mine, for that matter. But maybe we can start
thinking about what the answers might be, begin groping towards some kind of
idea of what it is like to love God and our neighbour—whoever they might be.
Love is often seen as a fuzzy, sweet,
cuddly emotion. Tell that to the parent protecting her or his child—love can be
fierce. Love is not just about roses and
chocolates and forever after—anyone who has had rough spots in their relationships
can tell you that. Love can be complicated—sometimes you love a person but
cannot stand to be near them; or what they are going through is more than you
can deal with—serious illness or addiction or a family situation or a spiritual
crisis. Love is not simple, it is not all sweetness and light.
We can quote 1 Corinthians 13:4-13—the famous “love chapter,” often used at weddings
and Holy Unions: “Love is
patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It
does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not
rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes
all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these
three; and the greatest of these is love.” But ideally, these verses apply to
any love, not only romantic or partnership love. Think of parental love, or
between siblings, or friends. And even that sometimes abstract love of
neighbours—ideally, this is true of how we love our neighbours as well, isn’t
it? We are patient, we believe in each other, we hope for each other.
And, of course, the key word there is
“ideally.” Many parents, siblings, lovers, neighbours do not live up to this
ideal—we don’t either, if we are honest with ourselves.
Dorothy Day was an amazing woman who
worked with the economically-disadvantaged in New York in the middle years of
the last century. She was Catholic, an anarchist, and a social activist—a heady
combination! She once said, “I really only love God as much as I love the
person I love the least."
The person I love the least. It can be
difficult to like some people; to enjoy them, to want to be with them, to
understand them, maybe; to accept everything they do. But that does not mean we
cannot love them. Love isn’t a feeling as much as it is an action—you may not
like someone, but you can show your love for them by forgiving them, serving
them, healing them. It can be easy to say, “I love you,” but love is shown in
action—in the daily acts of caring that reinforce that love. It’s shown in
mutual support by a couple, by a parent insisting that a child learn to be
self-sufficient, by siblings sharing grief, by friends celebrating good news
together. As the saying goes, “talk is
cheap.” Doing is harder. I personally put more credence in the actions of
someone than in what they say—don’t you?
The
how of that love is described in the reading from Leviticus—justice,
impartiality, honesty, forgiveness. Now, there’s also a mention of “reproving
your neighbour or you will incur guilt.” This verse has been so misused, along
with one from Paul, which mentions “speaking the truth in love.” It has been
used to say hurtful and even hateful things to people, under the self-righteous
pretence of “speaking the truth in love.” It has even been used to condemn the
marginalized, the infamous “hate the sin, love the sinner.” It can be abused
and twisted to excuse judgemental comments of all sorts. But the rest of the
reading, all those verses around it, indicate that this is exactly what is not
permitted—judgemental faultfinding by the self-righteous.
But the commandment is to love God and
each other—to love, not judge or condemn or elevate yourself. We are to love
others as we love ourselves. And the reverse is true—we cannot love others
until we love ourselves. We cannot accept others until we accept ourselves. We
cannot forgive others until we forgive ourselves.
But it is more than that. When we become
angry or unforgiving of others, then we are giving them power—we are allowing
them to dictate how we feel about them and ourselves. Instead, by no becoming
angry, we make the choice to love—remember, you don’t have to like someone to
love them—and thus to forgive.
I am not saying to accept the judgement
of others—I don’t mean that we have to accept what other people think of us as
truth. There is a difference between strong feeling, passion, on the one hand,
and anger on the other. Passion is acceptable—stating your position, your
feelings. Anger, judgement of the other person as being stupid, wrong,
crazy—that is not acceptable.
So I’m not arguing for being a doormat.
I am insisting that we have a choice in how we deal with this sort of
judgement, of statement. The choice we make can be for love or it can be for
judgement. It is up to us. God has told us what is good—to love God with all
our power and our neighbours as ourselves.
It is not always easy; but then, the
right path, the right choice, is often the most difficult. Sometimes that is
how we know it is the right path—because it is more difficult. It’s harder to
accept and reach out in Christian love to someone who thinks that because of your
gender, age, race, nationality, you are less than they are; or that you are
wrong in the eyes of God because of actions you felt called by God to take. Many
churches still will not ordain women; some will attempt to exorcise gay men, as
if they were possessed by a devil; there are others whose services are rigidly
segregated by race or class; and so on. But who are we to deny what God has
called someone to do?
The difference, I think, is not
insisting that everyone believe in the same way, and acknowledging that others
may have different beliefs, ways of living, and viewpoints. If Person A
believes that women should not be ordained, and belongs to a church that does
not ordain women, then I am not going to tell them they are foolish and
wrong—they have their belief. But—and this is the not being a doormat part—I
believe—obviously—that women can and should be ordained—that I am not to stand
in the way of a person who is called by God, and therefore I must insist that
Person A’s beliefs cannot be used to decide how my church, the church I
attend and whose beliefs I hold, will operate. Person A has a belief, I have a
differing belief. I respect that belief—but mine must also be respected. I am
not going to judge them—I will love my neighbour as myself—and I will look for
a reciprocal respect.
That is how we love our neighbours—by
respecting their beliefs, seeing them as our sisters and brothers who may have
different ideas or beliefs, but who nonetheless are made in the image of God,
as we are, and who therefore is to be loved as we love ourselves.
So here’s a challenge for you for this
week. Remember that quote from Dorothy Day? “I really only love God as much as
I love the person I love the least." Who is it in your life, your daily
everyday life, that you love the least? I’m not talking about world leaders or
politicians, or historical figures. I mean someone you interact with, or used
to interact with, who you find it hard to love as you love yourself. You don’t
have to like them, remember—but you do have to love them. Maybe it’s a former
partner, or a parent or sibling; maybe it’s a boss or co-worker or neighbour or
even a friend. Whoever that person is,
focus on loving them—seeing God in them, praying for them, loving them as you
love yourself. I’m not saying it will be easy or simple—even thinking of them
may bring back painful memories , or revive the frustration of the
relationship. But if you continue to try, to pray for them, to love them as you
love yourself—you will find, eventually, a change in how you see them. It
probably will not happen in a few days, and maybe not in a few weeks or months.
But keep at it—keep seeing God in them, keep loving them as you love yourself.
For this is the greatest commandment—to
love one another as we love ourselves and as we ourselves are loved by God.
In all God’s many names, amen.
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