🕊️The Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost is centered on the theme of unity, an echo of Christ's prayer: "Ut sint unum." The entire liturgy is a call to charity as the bond of perfection, exhorting the faithful to live their vocation to holiness in humility, meekness, and peace. This day reminds us that the unity of the Church is not merely organizational, but a spiritual communion in the one Body of Christ, sustained by the dual commandment of love for God and neighbor, which summarizes the entire Law and the Prophets. St. Augustine synthesizes the primacy of this love with the famous maxim: "Love, and do what you will," for whoever truly loves God and neighbor cannot sin against charity, which is the fulfillment of the law.
📖Introit (Ps 118: 137, 124 | ib., 1)
Justus es, Dómine, et rectum judícium tuum... Just art Thou, O Lord, and right is Thy judgment; deal with Thy servant according to Thy mercy. Ps. Blessed are the undefiled in the way, who walk in the law of the Lord. ℣. Glory be to the Father…
📜Epistle (Eph 4: 1-6)
Brethren: I therefore, a prisoner in the Lord, beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation in which you are called: with all humility and meekness, with patience, supporting one another in charity, careful to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. One body and one Spirit, as you are called in one hope of your calling. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, Who is above all, and through all, and in us all. Blessed be He for ever and ever. Amen.
✨Gospel (Mt 22: 34-46)
At that time, the Pharisees came to Jesus, and one of them, a doctor of the law, asked Him, tempting Him: Master, which is the great commandment in the law? Jesus said to him: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments dependeth the whole law and the prophets. And the Pharisees being gathered together, Jesus asked them, saying: What think you of Christ? whose son is He? They say to Him: David’s. He saith to them: How then doth David in spirit call Him Lord, saying: The Lord said to my Lord: Sit on my right hand, until I make Thy enemies Thy footstool? If David then call Him Lord, how is He his son? And no man was able to answer Him a word; neither durst any man from that day forth ask Him any more questions.
🤔Reflections
⚖️The love of God with the whole heart, soul, and mind is the ordering principle of all spiritual life, of which the love of neighbor is the necessary consequence and proof. St. Augustine teaches that these two precepts "contain the whole law and the prophets," for there is no precept that does not refer to one of them; one unites us to God, the other to our fellow man, but both spring from the same fount of charity. Christ's subsequent question about His divine sonship reveals the source of this charity: only by loving God made man, who is at once the Son of David and the Lord of David, can we perfectly fulfill this dual commandment. (St. Augustine, Sermon 90).
🤝The unity described by St. Paul is not a forced uniformity but an organic harmony in the Holy Spirit. St. John Chrysostom explains that the exhortation to "support one another in charity" is the practical exercise that maintains the "bond of peace." He highlights that the virtues of humility and meekness are the guardians of this unity, for pride is the root of all discord in the Church. The unity of faith, of baptism, and of the one God is not merely a truth to be believed, but a reality to be lived through mutual charity, which unites the diverse members into the one Body of Christ. (St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the Epistle to the Ephesians).
🏛️The doctrine of the Church as the Mystical Body of Christ, of which He is the Head and the faithful are the members, elucidates the depth of the call to unity. This magisterial teaching affirms that the union of the faithful is not merely moral, based on sharing the same sentiments, but an ontological and supernatural reality. Charity, which is the soul of this Body, is infused by the Holy Spirit and unites us to Christ and to one another in a real way. Thus, the dual commandment of love is not just an ethical ideal but the vital law that governs the very being of the Church, ensuring its cohesion and peace against all forces of division. (Cf. Pius XII, Encyclical Mystici Corporis Christi).
🧐See English version of the critical articles here.
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