(For the audio version of this blog, please visit: https://brothersinchristcmf.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Mass-Blog-for-the-31st-Sunday-of-Ordinary-Time-2024.mp3)
Jesus passes an oral exam administered by a scribe in this Sunday’s gospel reading (Mk 12:28b-34). At least the scribe thinks he’s the administrator. “Which is the first of all the commandments?” he asks.
Jesus wisely quotes Moses’ words, taken from our first reading (Dt 6:2-6): “You shall love the LORD, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength.”
But he’s sure to add: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
When the scribe congratulates Jesus on passing his little exam, Jesus turns the tables and congratulates him on his proximity to God’s Kingdom.
The rewards of entry? Growth and prosperity in “a land flowing with milk and honey.” Jesus offers himself as the doorway: “holy, innocent, and undefiled,” as Paul describes our high priest in Sunday’s letter to the Hebrews (Heb 7:23-28). He joyfully opened himself to death so those who know sin may also know that they can exit death’s portal as Jesus did—alive. Entrants can experience the added joy and courage inspired by the knowledge that God’s love destroyed their sin. All they have to do is open themselves to that love.
Getting to know that kind of love brings true freedom, and is the source of the kind of joy learned by all saints.
On All Saints Day we celebrated the courage of all the saints whom Jesus blesses through his Beatitudes (Mt 5:1-12a). These people learn how to rejoice—not despite their mourning, but because of the source of their joy. They’re comforted by the same mercy that makes them channels of it. God’s channels of mercy purify hearts, creating the joy that makes beneficiaries impervious to insults, persecution and evil. This kind of shielding frees all souls to enter God’s Kingdom as God’s children (1 Jn 3:1-3).
The inheritance of all saints is the freedom to share in God’s love forever. Sharing in it requires sharing it with those whom life tests with the persistence of a Kingdom-coveting Pharisee.
Once we pass our own life’s test, questions are no longer necessary. Or possible.
–Tom Andel