A woman was married to a man who was a walking rule. To make sure that his wife fulfilled all her obligations the man drew up for her a set of rules. His list of do’s and don’ts included when she should get up in the morning, when to serve his breakfast and what household chores she should do before he came back from work. Many years later this man died. With time the woman met another man who was not controlling. Soon they were married. Her new husband did not give her a list of do’s and don’ts. He simply showered her with gestures of love and words of praise and compliments for everything she did. One day while cleaning the house, the woman found the old list of do’s and don’ts that her former husband had made for her. Going through the list, she discovered that she was doing those things and more for her new husband even though he did not give her any rules. More importantly, she had been doing them lovingly and without stress.

This goes to show there are two ways of meeting our obligations to one another. One is by following the details of the law, the other is by love. The woman caught in adultery in John’s Gospel, chapter eight, broke the details of the law and, according to the law, she was to be stoned to death. But Jesus offered another law and that was the law of love. He forgave the woman, and simply told her: “Go and sin no more.”

According the Mosaic law, the best way to secure justice was by the law. Jesus gives a different answer. The best way to secure justice is by love. The only debt we owe one another is to love one another, says St. Paul, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. (Romans 13:8).

Many Christians, unwittingly perhaps, see love as an option rather than a debt they owe to each other. Love is not something we may choose to do or not to do. Of course, we are free to love anyone we choose as far as intimate relationships are concerned. That, however, is a different kind of love. It is the love that exists between the sexes, between members of the same family, and between friends. The love of the Christian is a higher calling. It is something we owe to God and to one another, and Jesus is the example of this kind of love.

How often people make excuses for their actions when they feel they don’t owe somebody anything. We hear this, for example, when a beggar or someone in need asks for help, or when a needy person is dismissed with the angry retort: “Stop bugging me.” Of course, we do not owe them in the legal sense, but we do indeed owe them in the way Jesus shows us.

Many people today suffer from a serious lack of awareness and sensitivity for their fellow man. When they hear that a country is devastated by drought and famine, do they feel they owe them? When they hear that HIV-AIDS is wiping out generations of young people in certain countries, do they feel they owe them? The legally minded will say, “No, we don’t.” Jesus says, “yes, we do,” and wants us to show our love towards all our brothers and sisters the way He has loved us.

Jesus entered our world to show us this kind of perfect love which is called, agape. May you possess this kind of love that fills your heart with the joy of giving, and with the joy of seeing Christ in the least of your brothers and sisters.

—Fr. Hugh Duffy