I — FRATERNAL CHARITY

Presence of God. — O Lord, grant me to penetrate the deep meaning of the precept of fraternal charity.

Meditation

1 — Jesus proposed to us as the foundation of the whole law not only the precept of love of God, “the first and greatest commandment,” but also the precept of love of neighbor, expressly declaring it “like” the first (Mt. 22:38-39). That the precept of love of God is the basis of all Christian life is easy to understand, but it is not equally easy to understand that the precept of fraternal charity is as well. Yet Jesus has connected these two commandments so closely as to make us understand that one cannot subsist without the other, and vice versa. He did not say that everything rests on the first commandment, that of love of God, but rather: “on these two commandments [of love of God and love of neighbor] depend all the law and the prophets” (ibid., 40). But why place love of neighbor so close to love of God, why make of it with that love the one foundation of all Christianity? Because the virtue of fraternal charity is not love of the creature in itself and for itself, but love of the creature propter Deum, that is, in view of God, by reason of its relationship with God. In other words, we must understand well that God commands us to love Him not only in Himself, but also in his rational creatures, whom He has been pleased to create in his image and likeness. As a father desires to be loved and respected not only in his own person but also in his children, so God desires to be loved not only in Himself but also in his creatures; and He desires it to such a degree that He considers as done to Himself everything done to any man. “Truly I say to you,” Jesus said, “as often as you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me” (Mt. 25:40). Fraternal charity is so important because it is nothing other than an extension of charity toward God, an extension that embraces all men in view of God, their Creator and their Father. Precisely for this reason the precept of love of neighbor is inseparable from that of love of God.

2 — God is so intent on being loved in our neighbor that He places this love as an essential condition of our eternal salvation. When Jesus speaks to us of the final judgment, He gives no other motive for the justification of the good and the damnation of the reprobate than the works of mercy done or omitted toward neighbor. “Come, blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.” But why? “For I was hungry and you gave me to eat; I was thirsty and you gave me to drink...” (Mt. 25:34-35). I was hungry in the poor; I was thirsty in your neighbor. If it is very consoling to think that God regards and rewards as done to Himself the works of charity practiced toward neighbor, it is equally grave to think that He regards as directed against Himself the failures in charity committed toward that same neighbor. Jesus, who is the personification of the goodness and infinite mercy of the heavenly Father, does not hesitate to pronounce the sentence of eternal condemnation on those who have not loved, not helped, not consoled their neighbor. Why? Because: “Truly I say to you, as often as you did not do [such things] to one of these least among my brethren, you did not do it to me” (Mt. 25:45). God demands concrete proof of our love toward Him in the way we behave toward neighbor. We cannot deceive ourselves into thinking that we love God when we do not love our fellow men, who like us are the living image of the heavenly Father. And what does it matter if at times this image is disfigured by defects, sin, and perhaps even vices? It still remains God’s image, an image that charity must make us recognize, venerate, and love in every man and in whatever condition he may be. We cannot be satisfied with loving God in an ideal way; we must love Him realistically, in the concreteness of our relationships with neighbor: here is the surest proof of our love for God.

Colloquy

“O charity, you are as great as my very God, because God is charity. You fly so high that you go to the throne of the Most Holy Trinity, and there you enter the bosom of the eternal Father; and from the bosom of the Father you go to the Heart of the Incarnate Word, and there you rest and draw your nourishment. Thus the soul that possesses you seeks to nourish itself only on God and to rest in Him; and after nourishing and resting there, it comes down to earth, because you, O charity, extend also to neighbors, loving them not only as creatures but as beings created by God in his image and likeness. You do not stop at loving bodies, which are the husk, but you penetrate into the interior of souls, and those you love above all. You do not stop at God’s gifts, but rise to the Giver, and love all solely in Him.

“O charity, you are so sublime that you unite us to God! You can do all things, and in the Church you produce a kind of trinity in likeness of the Most Holy Trinity. For as the Father is God, the Son is God, the Holy Spirit is God, and all three are united and are one same thing, so through your power, O charity, this union comes to us: for you unite the soul to God and one neighbor to another, and thus in the Church you form, invisibly, a kind of trinity.

“Whoever possesses you, O charity, feeds himself on God to the point of becoming like Him by grace and participation.

“Grant me, my God, a charity so perfect that I may know how to condescend to, help, and lift up my neighbor in all his needs, infirmities, and labors, and may know with utmost prudence how to bear with others’ defects” (cf. St. Mary Magdalene de’ Pazzi).