Sunday Sermon

I have a Muslim in-law and yesterday he called to say he was going to visit our family burial plot with his wife, my niece, to offer prayers for my recently deceased daughter. He asked if my wife and I would like to come. He was visiting the grave whether we went or not. We were eager and interested to go. We drove there in his new car and lit incense and candles. He spoke about how we might honor her memory, he chanted from the Koran as we sat by the grave and after a time of silence, we all left. He murmured a prayer before he started the car.

Today's gospel is the lawyer's famous question, "What is the greatest commandment?" Christ' answer is peculiar; essentially we are to love God. The second is to love your neighbor as yourself. This seems peculiar because it is so simple and yet so general. It is particularly interesting when seen in the context of its origin. The original commandment is from Leviticus in the Old Testament where the commandments are anything but general. Leviticus is filled with directions and proscriptions; it is a collection of commandments on agriculture, families, loans--it is a manual of life, a handbook for assorted life problems and moments including the most minute, things like how to sow your field and how to harvest. Christ' answer is the same answer as Leviticus but yet quite different. He is not giving a list of behaviors or restrictions, he is commanding a way of life.

Loving God, loving your neighbor as yourself are not prohibitions or constrictions, they are ways to live that should be the starting point, the center of man's life. Nothing but good will flow from it. The agriculture, the animal husbandry will take care of themselves if these basic concepts are taken to heart.

Christians used to be quite visible on Sunday. Sometimes a family in a restaurant would pray before a meal in a restaurant or a Catholic college student inadvertently write "JMJ" on the top of an assignment or an exam. But no more. Somehow religion in the West has become an interest or pursuit with its defined time and place.

But my Muslim nephew-in-law lives his belief.