Our Neighbors

For John, BLUF:  Our life as a child of God involves our love for our fellow humans.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Thirtieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

From The Gospel of Matthew, 22:34-40.

Here is the Gospel Reading:

When the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees,
they gathered together, and one of them,
a scholar of the law tested him by asking,
"Teacher, which commandment in the law is the greatest?"
He said to him,
"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.
The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments."

Jesus is being tested by the Pharisees.  His response raises some interesting questionss.

I once heard someone note that if we look at this from bottom to top we can see the importance of our own sense of self-worth.  If our love of neighbor is to be strong, then our love of self needs to be strong—"You shall love your neighbor as yourself."  My sense of the New Testiment is that we show our love of God by our efforts to love our neighbors, even the cranky ones, and the ones from the other political party.

Regards  —  Cliff