A Quinquagesima Sunday Thought About How Easy It Is (Should Be) To Love God

It's Quinquagesima Sunday in the traditional Liturgical calendar. We prepare for Lent.

Our guest commentator today will explain how easy it is - or should be - to love God. Ideal for a Sunday, since we Catholics will attend Mass and possibly receive Him Body, Blood, Soul, Divinity in Holy Communion. 

So we're going to worship Him, witness His Sacrifice, and eat His Body and Blood. 

Why do we do this? Is it because we're expected to do it, or have been told that we're obligated to attend Mass? If so, it's certainly better than ignoring Mass and avoiding Holy Communion. But if we consider what the Mass really is, what Holy Communion really is, and what we're actually doing, obligation doesn't quite fit, does it?

What makes more sense would be that we love our Lord. And because of our love we want to honor Him in our worship and take Him into our body and soul by receiving Holy Communion. 

Love more than obligation. And certainly more than fear - that bugbear that some of us somehow take with us when we fulfill any of our religious obligations: We do it because of our fear of punishment if we don't. 

We could spend many posts sorting through why love really should be our go-to when it comes to our relationship with Jesus. But let's simply go with it today.

If we get this, if that makes sense, then we can get the most of Fr. Daniel Considine's comments. We'll see why Jesus is lovable - and why He loves us as much, no, even more than we can ever love Him. Father uses simple comparisons with our relationships with people we love. 

Jesus loves us so much. He simply asks for our love in return. And if we're willing to love Him, even if we're unsure of how to go about best doing that, just remember that He will give us the grace we need to see our way to Him in love.

Sunday now becomes a day to love Jesus. And with that, everyday becomes a day to love Jesus. Our life will thus be filled with this extraordinary love: God's love for us, our love for God.

Incredibly wondrous and beautiful! 

    “The great object of the devotion to the Sacred Heart is that it should teach us to love our Lord because He loves us. We were brought into the world solely because He loved us, and He wanted our love. He wants to do us good. He longs to do us good. He wants to know us, and wants us to know Him. He longs to heap His love upon us, to draw us very near to Him. We tie His hands by our coldness, our callousness, our indifference. We have such a wrong idea of Him. He is not always on the lookout to catch us tripping; or wanting to keep us persistently in suspense as to whether we shall save our souls… From our childhood many of us have been told so much more of the punishments God has in store for us if we fail to please Him than of the rewards He looks forward to giving us when we do please Him. In preparing for Confession, we spend nine minutes in examining our conscience and one minute in telling our Lord we are sorry. The first thing necessary in loving our Lord is to believe Him lovable. What are the sort of persons one loves? First, they must be easy to get on with. How many, in their heart of hearts, think our Lord easy to get on with? We think Him touchy, unapproachable, easily annoyed or offended. And yet all this fear of Him pains Him very much. Would our father wish us to hang our heads, be shy and shrinking in his presence? How much less so our Heavenly Father! He has an almost foolish love for us. Never was a mother so blind to the faults of her child as our Lord is to ours. He makes allowances to an almost extravagant degree. He is infinitely quicker to pity and help than to blame and punish. Whatever attracts you in your fellow creatures is His gift, and possessed by Him in a higher sense. And yet how many ascribe to Him mean and petty ways, trying to catch us out, to be ungenerous – conduct we would not tolerate in human friendship. There is nothing easier than to love God, because there is nothing unlovable in Him. God is Love. He asks our love in return. O my God, do Thou fill my heart, my soul, my whole being with the fire of Thy divine Love. Thou, O my God, art the God of my heart, and my portion forever.” - Fr. Daniel Considine, S.J.

Happy Sunday!