The Catholic Calendar for Friday, August 25, 2006
Friday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time
St. Louis, St. Joseph Calasanz

Scripture from today's Liturgy of the Word:
Ezekiel 37:1-14
Psalm 107:2-9
Matthew 22:34-40

A reflection on today's Sacred Scripture:

"The whole law and prophets depend on these two commandments." (Matt. 22:40)

Ezekiel's prophetic vision of the "dry bones" being brought back to life should erase any despair we may feel over our present day moral decline. God's everlasting love for His fallen creatures remains His motive force. He created humanity to share in His very life and His glory. Though we may separate ourselves from Him through sin, He is ever eager to restore us, to imbue us with new life through His Spirit. Christ is the fulfillment of Ezekiel's prophetic vision, for, if we live in loving obedience to Him, God's Word of Life, we will be born anew to share in His eternal blessings. Psalm 107 expresses this same hope, shows God gathering His people out of the desert wilderness of sin into the new Jerusalem where their starving souls will be perfectly nourished with His love and truth.

Conflicts will continue to arise on two fronts; man's free will, perverted by sin, will insist on satisfying the desires of the flesh, seize upon worldly things that only temporarily appease desires for physical beauty, longevity, money, property, fame, pleasure and sex. God's Spirit, however, tries to steer us toward seeking eternal and imperishable riches; He works to fill us with a sincere love for God and one another and instill in us those virtues that make it possible for humanity to live in a world pervaded by justice and peace.

The first Commandment cited by Christ in today's Gospel is the heart of all God's law because it expresses the very Essence of His Being which is Love. Unless we draw close to Him in prayer, love's Source, we can never come to know how to love Him and one another purely, genuinely and unconditionally. Neither will we be enabled to discern truth, for all truth actually is inherent in and springs forth from the Love Who is God. Willful rejection of God, a deliberate separation from Him Who is both love and truth, inevitably results in self-imposed spiritual death.

Bountiful God, may we love You above all else, and being filled to overflowing with Your precious life, may we help to make this world of one mind and heart in You. Amen.

- Marie Bocko, OCDS
(mlbocko at earthlink dot net)