A Latin spiritual journey with discerning hearts, from ashes to glory.

Day 22, the law of love.

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew, chapter 22, verses 37 through 40.

Jesus 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 neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the

law and the prophets. Jesus distills the entire law and prophetic tradition in two commandments,

to love God and to love our neighbor. At the heart of the Christian life is the law of love,

simple in words, yet profound and demanding in practice.

In the scriptures and the Christian tradition,

we see that love is not a single concept,

but a reality with many expressions.

The New Testament, written in Greek, refers to several kinds of love.

Philea, brotherly affection, eros, romantic or passionate love, and agape,

a self-giving, sacrificial love that wills the good of the other even when it costs

us. It is this Agape love that Christ speaks of and models most fully on the cross.

Agape is not about liking someone or feeling warmth in their presence. It is not contingent on emotion.

It is an act of the will, a deliberate choice to love even when we are tired, wounded, or feeling nothing at all.

This is why Jesus can command love, not as sentiment, but as decision.

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