Thursday, May 14th, 2020

What is love?  A famous song of the nineties attempts to answer this question in its lyrics: “What is love? Baby don’t hurt me. Don’t hurt me. No more.” Certainly one assumes that if one is free to use the word ‘baby’ as a mode of address without having their face slapped off, there is probably some kind of love happening there. The problem of course with this definition is that if this is love, it is a very empty one. To not hurt is on the fairly cold limits of the burning heart which is love. Jesus, Love Incarnate, gives us his definition today: One, “If you keep my commandmentsyou will remain in my love,” - in other words, the very basics of love are to keep the commandments. But two, as he says, “A man can have no greater love than to lay down his life for his friends.” This is the heart of love: to give my life for the other. Not just in heroic fantasy: but in day to day patience, attentiveness and service, whatever the circumstances. Let us ask for that supernatural gift of love today.

Let us pray:

“O God, who assigned Saint Matthias a place in the college of Apostles, grant us, through his intercession, that, rejoicing at how your love has been allotted to us, we may merit to be numbered among the elect. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.”