Thursday after Epiphany
After reading and praying on the words John puts to us today from his first letter, I have to ask myself a really important question. Am I a liar?
If I say I love God, which I do say, but I hate a brother, then I am, in fact, a liar. John takes us through the reasoning for this. I can’t really love God if I hate a brother because God commands that I love my brother (and my sister). If I don’t love my brother and my sister . . . even worse, if I hate my brother or my sister, then I am refusing to follow God’s commandment and I am rejecting God.
It is not enough, in other words, for me to say that I love God. I have to do it. And doing it means loving my brother and my sister in this world, in this life, every day. Oh, and surely not just my biological brother and sister. God means all my brothers and sisters—that is, all God’s children.
As John is working through this reasoning, he points out that if we cannot love the brother (or sister) that we can see then we cannot love the God we cannot see. What does this mean? On one level, it seems a simple point: if you cannot love the one who is right in front of you—concrete, specific, flesh and blood—then you cannot possibly love the God you cannot see (or fathom or understand or comprehend). That makes sense. But I wonder if there is more to this than just that.
What if John is trying to tell us that it is not enough to say that we love all God’s children; we have to actually love all God’s children. And that includes the brothers and sisters we encounter in our families, our neighborhoods, at Mass, in the grocery store, at school, at work, on our roads and highways, Facebook, a political protest, via news reports, talk shows, and so forth. If we cannot love the myriad children of God that we encounter in all these ways, then we cannot love the God who created them and loves them.
Speaking for myself, as I move outward from my family I confess that it gets harder. I am so fortunate to have a really loving family. And Bill and I are so lucky to have great neighbors. And I love seeing all my IC brothers and sisters at Mass. Having now shopped at my local grocery store for over a decade, I can say that I have friends there. And then there’s work—I have the great privilege of teaching at UD where I have wonderful colleagues and earnest students. As I write this I recognized how blessed my life is—so many people in it who are so easy to love.
But what happens when I get beyond these sorts of circles? Or, to put the point in bold relief—what happens when I encounter someone—real flesh and blood—who, say, promotes capital punishment, or culture war, or white supremacy? How can I love that child of God?
I honestly don’t know. Yet, I am called to do so. John closes our reading for today with the reminder that keeping God’s commandments is not burdensome. Really? How can this be so? His answer is faith. In other words, let go, Sue. Just love—maybe with a prayer on their behalf or an act of kindness toward them or even just by actively acknowledging that this person I can’t imagine ever befriending is my brother or my sister. And let God take care of the rest.
- Sue Trollinger