Memory of Jesus crucified
Reading of the Word of God
Praise to you, o Lord, King of eternal glory
This is the Gospel of the poor,
liberation for the imprisoned,
sight for the blind,
freedom for the oppressed.
Praise to you, o Lord, King of eternal glory
Mark 12,28-34
One of the scribes who had listened to them debating appreciated that Jesus had given a good answer and put a further question to him, 'Which is the first of all the commandments?' Jesus replied, 'This is the first: Listen, Israel, the Lord our God is the one, only Lord, and you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. The second is this: You must love your neighbour as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.' The scribe said to him, 'Well spoken, Master; what you have said is true, that he is one and there is no other. To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and strength, and to love your neighbour as yourself, this is far more important than any burnt offering or sacrifice.' Jesus, seeing how wisely he had spoken, said, 'You are not far from the kingdom of God.' And after that no one dared to question him any more.
Praise to you, o Lord, King of eternal glory
The Son of Man came to serve,
whoever wants to be great
should become servant of all.
Praise to you, o Lord, King of eternal glory
The passage from Mark's Gospel takes place in the context of Jesus' ministry in Jerusalem. Amidst the increasingly threatening hostility of the leaders of the people, comes a sincere request made by a scribe who turns to Jesus and asks: "Which commandment is the first of all?" He was a wise scribe, and he was aware that he did not have all truth in his possession and needed to learn from a wiser teacher. Indeed, we all need to ask the Spirit that was given to us the meaning of the Scriptures for our lives and the world. No one is teacher to oneself. Unfortunately, we easily forget to open and listen to the Scriptures in a spirit of prayer, feeling sure of ourselves and thinking that we already know what to do and how to live. This is the sin of pride and self-sufficiency that leads us to think we can even do without God and His word. This wise scribe today teaches us how we should stand before Jesus and together with him ask Jesus: "Master, what is the heart of the Gospel?" Jesus responds in an articulate way as if to make us understand that without him, without his Holy Spirit, is difficult to understand the Scriptures. Jesus says the "first commandment" is twofold: love God and love your neighbour. These two loves cannot be separated; in fact, they form one love, one thing. It is not possible to divide God from our neighbour. Also the apostle John reminds us: "Those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen" (1 Jn 4:20). Jesus himself shows it to us: he loved the Father more than anything else, more than his own life, and equally loved men and women more than anything else, more than his own life. Certainly, to understand the uniqueness of the love of God and of our neighbour, there is a prior invitation that must be accepted: "The first [commandment] is: Hear, Israel." It is the invitation that is continuously repeated to us in this time of Lent: the need to listen to God who speaks to us. Whoever does not listen will only hear the noise of oneself and will not be able to live the commandment of love fully.