6TH SUNDAY ORDINARY TIME – YEAR A (2025)

Posted on by Dave

ECCLESIASTICUS 15: 15-20
PSALM 118: 1-2, 4-5, 17-18, 33-34 R. v. 1
1 CORINTHIANS 2: 6-10
MATTHEW 5: 17-37

Imagine someone coming to ask you for help. How ready will you be in helping him or her? I think our readiness will depend who is asking for help. And if we do help, the level we will be ready to help will also depend on who is asking. If the person is a beggar or someone we dislike, would we find an excuse not to help? Would we help an acquaintance the same was as we would a close friend? What would we do if it was someone we loved?

The reason for the different responses is simply one of relationship: love. Where there is love, there will always be a greater respond to help the other, to care for the other, to seek the good of the other.

For the people of Israel, the Law God gave them through Moses is central to their relationship with God. It was central to the covenant God made with them. Keeping the Law was being faithful to the covenant. It defined their relationship with God and the community.

The shortfall of all written laws though is that it does not necessarily build relationships. What is missing is that people can follow the Law but not seek the love of God. Just following the law has no heart in it. Jesus saw this in many of the Pharisees and Sadducees…

And so in today’s Gospel, Jesus says that he did not come to abolish the Law but to emphasize the depth of the meaning of God’s law which is God’s love to see others as God sees them. For God’s law is there to give life that builds relationship. This is what it means to be salt of the earth and light to the world which Jesus calls us to be in last week’s Gospel reading.

Jesus then goes on to show in two commandments what it means to love in following God’s law. The challenge for all of us is that sometimes we let our emotions control our actions.

One way of reflecting on our faithfulness to God in following His law of love is to ask ourselves, “How have we been life giving to others?” It is a question of whether we are self-centered filled with self-pity or are we concern about the welfare of our neighbour.
The more we are self-centered, the more we let our emotions control us.

The same question can be asked of our relationship with God. Where is our love for God in our religious practices?

It is God who eventually reveals what love is all about. The cross is the great image of the love of God who gave up everything out of love for us even for those who crucified him that we may have eternal life.