List of points

Now that we are at the beginning of Holy Week, and so very close to the moment when the Redemption of the whole human race was accomplished on Calvary, it seems to be an especially appropriate time for you and me to reflect on how Our Lord Jesus Christ saved us, and to contemplate this love of his — this truly inexpressible love — for poor creatures like us, who have been made from the clay of the earth.

Memento homo, quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteris. Thus did our Mother the Church admonish us at the beginning of Lent so that we might never forget how very little we are, and that some day our bodies, now so full of life, will dissolve like a cloud of dust kicked up by our footsteps on a country road and will pass away 'like a mist dispersed by the rays of the sun'.

But after this stark reminder of our personal insignificance, I would also like to put before you another splendid truth: the magnificence of God who sustains and divinises us. Listen to the words of the Apostle: 'You know the graciousness of Our Lord Jesus Christ, how, being rich, he became poor for our sakes, that by his poverty you might become rich.' Reflect calmly on this example of Our Lord, and you will see at once that here we have abundant material on which we could meditate a whole lifetime and from which to draw specific and sincere resolutions to be more generous. We should never lose sight of the goal which we have to reach, namely, that each one of us must become identified with Jesus Christ, who, as you have just heard, became poor for you and for me, and suffered, that we might have an example of how to follow in his footsteps.

From his position in the multitude a man asks Our Lord a question. He was one of those learned men who were no longer able to understand the teaching that had been revealed to Moses, so entangled had it become because of their own sterile casuistry. Jesus opens his divine lips to reply to this doctor of the law and answers him slowly, with the calm assurance of one who knows what he is talking about: 'You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart, and your whole soul, and your whole mind. This is the greatest of the commandments and the first. And the second, its like, is this, You shall love your neighbour as yourself. On these two commandments all the law and the prophets depend.'

Let us now consider the Master and his disciples gathered together in the intimacy of the Upper Room. The time of his Passion is drawing close and he is surrounded by those he loves. The fire in the Heart of Christ bursts into flame in a way no words can express and he confides in them, 'I give you a new commandment that you love one another, just as I have loved you, you also must love one another. By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.'

If you wish to get close to Our Lord through the pages of the Gospels, I always recommend that you try to enter in on the scene taking part as just one more person there. In this way (and I know many perfectly ordinary people who live this way) you will be captivated like Mary was, who hung on every word that Jesus uttered or, like Martha, you will boldly make your worries known to him, opening your heart sincerely about them all no matter how little they may be.

Lord, why do you call it a new commandment? As we have just heard, it was already laid down in the Old Testament that we should love our neighbour. You will remember also that, when Jesus had scarcely begun his public life, he broadened the scope of this law with divine generosity: 'You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy. But I tell you, Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, pray for those who persecute and slander you.'

But, Lord, please allow us to insist. Why do you still call this precept new? That night, just a few hours before offering yourself in sacrifice on the Cross, during your intimate conversation with the men who — in spite of being weak and wretched, like ourselves — accompanied you to Jerusalem, you revealed to us the standard for our charity, one we could never have suspected: 'as I have loved you'. How well the apostles must have understood you, having witnessed for themselves your unbounded love.

The Master's message and example are clear and precise. He confirmed his teaching with deeds. Yet I have often thought that, after twenty centuries, it is indeed still a new commandment because very few people have taken the trouble to practise it. The others, the majority of men, both in the past and still today, have chosen to ignore it. Their selfishness has led them to the conclusion: 'Why should I complicate my life? I have more than enough to do just looking after myself.'

Such an attitude is not good enough for us Christians. If we profess the same faith and are really eager to follow in the clear footprints left by Christ when he walked on this earth, we cannot be content merely with avoiding doing unto others the evil that we would not have them do unto us. That is a lot, but it is still very little when we consider that our love is to be measured in terms of Jesus' own conduct. Besides, he does not give us this standard as a distant target, as a crowning point of a whole lifetime of struggle. It is — it ought to be, I repeat so that you may turn it into specific resolutions — the starting point, for Our Lord presents it as a sign of Christianity: 'By this shall all men know that you are my disciples.'

Our Lord Jesus Christ became incarnate and took on our nature to reveal himself to mankind as the model of all virtues, 'Learn from me,' he says to us, 'for I am meek and humble of heart.'

Later, when he explains to the Apostles the mark by which they will be known as Christians, he does not say, 'Because you are humble.' He is purity most sublime, the immaculate Lamb. Nothing could stain his perfect, unspotted holiness. Yet he does not say, 'You will be known as my disciples because you are chaste and pure.'

He passed through this world completely detached from earthly goods. Though he is the Creator and Lord of the whole universe, he did not even have a place to lay his head. Nevertheless he does not say, 'They will know that you are mine because you are not attached to wealth.' Before setting out to preach the Gospel he spent forty days and forty nights in the desert keeping a strict fast. But, once again, he does not tell his disciples, 'Men will recognise you as God's servants because you are not gluttons or drunkards.'

No, the distinguishing mark of the apostles and of true Christians in every age is, as we have heard: 'By this', precisely by this, 'shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.'

I think it is perfectly understandable that God's children have always been deeply moved, as you and I are now, by our Master's insistence on this point. 'The Lord does not say that the proof of his disciples' faithfulness will be the working of wondrous miracles and prodigies, although he gave them the power to perform them, in the Holy Spirit. What does he tell them? "You shall be known as my disciples if you love one another."'

Doesn't it move you to find the apostle John in his old age devoting the best part of one of his epistles to exhorting us to follow this divine teaching? The love that ought to exist amongst us Christians is born of God who is Love. 'Beloved let us love one another; for charity comes from God, and he who loves is born of God and knows God. He who has no love does not know God, for God is Love.' He focuses on fraternal charity because through Christ we have become children of God: 'See what love the Father has shown towards us, that we should be called children of God, and should be such.'

At the same time as he raps sharply on our consciences to make them sensitive to God's grace, he also insists that we have received a marvellous proof of the Father's love for men, 'By this was made manifest the charity of God for us, that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, so that we might live through him.' It was the Lord who took the initiative by coming out to meet us. He gave us this example so that we might join him in serving others, generously placing our hearts on the ground, as I am fond of saying, so that others may tread softly and find their struggle more pleasant. This is how we should behave because we have been made children of the same Father, that Father who did not hesitate to give us his dearly beloved Son.

What kind of love are we talking about? Sacred Scripture uses the Latin word dilectio, to make us understand clearly that it does not simply mean the feeling of affection. It signifies, rather, a firm determination on the part of the will. Dilectio comes from electio, choice. I would add that, for Christians, loving means 'wanting to love', making up one's mind in Christ to work for the good of souls, without discrimination of any kind; trying to obtain for them, before any other good, the greatest good of all, that of knowing Christ and falling in love with him.

Our Lord spurs us on: 'Do good to those who hate you, pray for those who persecute and insult you.' We might not feel humanly attracted to those who would reject us were we to approach them. But Jesus insists: we must not return evil for evil; we must not waste any opportunities we have of serving them wholeheartedly, even if we find it difficult to do so; we must never cease keeping them in mind in our prayers.

This dilectio, this charity, becomes even more affectionate when its object is our brothers in the faith and particularly those who, by God's will, work close beside us: our parents, husband or wife, children, brothers and sisters, friends and colleagues, neighbours. Without this affection, which is a noble and pure human love directed towards God and based on him, there would be no charity.

We are now convinced that charity has nothing whatever in common with the caricature that sometimes has been made of this central virtue of the Christian life. Why, then is it necessary to preach about it so constantly? Is it just a topic that has to be preached about, but has little chance of being put into practice in everyday life?

If we look about us we could find reasons for believing that charity is a phantom virtue. But if we then consider things from a supernatural point of view, we can also see what is the root cause of this sterility: the absence of a continuous and intense, person-to-person relationship with Our Lord Jesus Christ, and an ignorance of the work of the Holy Spirit in the soul, whose very first fruit is precisely charity.

In commenting on St Paul's advice, 'bear one another's burdens and so you will fulfil the law of Christ', one of the Fathers of the Church says, 'By loving Christ we can easily bear the weaknesses of others, including those people whom we do not love as yet because they are lacking in good works.'

This is the direction taken by the path that makes us grow in charity. We would be mistaken were we to believe that we must first engage in humanitarian activities and social works, leaving the love for God to one side. 'Let us not neglect Christ out of concern for our neighbour's illness, for we ought to love the sick for the sake of Christ.'

Turn your gaze constantly to Jesus who, without ceasing to be God, humbled himself and took the nature of a slave, in order to serve us. Only by following in his direction will we find ideals that are worthwhile. Love seeks union, identification with the beloved. United to Christ, we will be drawn to imitate his life of dedication, his unlimited love and his sacrifice unto death. Christ brings us face to face with the ultimate choice: either we spend our life in selfish isolation, or we devote ourselves and all our energies to the service of others.

Let us now ask Our Lord, as we finish these moments of conversation with him, to enable us to say with St Paul, 'in all this we are conquerors, through him who has granted us his love. Of this I am fully persuaded: neither death nor life, nor angels or principalities or powers, neither what is present nor what is to come, no force whatever, neither the height above us nor the depth beneath us, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God, which comes to us in Christ Jesus Our Lord.'

Scripture sings the praises of this love with burning words: 'Many waters cannot quench charity, neither can the floods drown it.' So thoroughly did this love fill Mary's Heart that it enriched her to the point of making her a Mother for all mankind. In the Virgin Mary, her love of God is one with her concern for all her children. Her most sweet Heart, which was sensitive to the smallest details — 'they have no wine' — must have suffered immensely on seeing the collective cruelty and the ferocity of the executioners that led to the Passion and Death of Jesus. Mary, however, does not speak. Like her Son, she loves, keeps silent and forgives. Here we see the strength of love!