Let’s begin with three related questions: 1) What’s the most important issue in the world today? Climate change, war, human rights, the economy? 2) If you’re in school, what are you taught is the most important issue? 3) For parents, what’s your greatest concern for your children?
I’d like to propose that the most important issue is how much we love God. In the Gospel today, it says, “One of the scribes came near and heard the religious authorities disputing with one another, and seeing that Jesus answered them well, he asked him, ‘Which commandment is the first of all?’” (Mk 12:28). It’s well-known that there were 613 precepts in the Old Testament so it wasn’t an obvious answer which would be the most important, and notice that Jesus doesn’t even answer with the first of the Ten Commandments.
“Jesus answered, ‘The first is, “Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength”’” (12:29). Jesus quotes a Jewish prayer called Shemà, which was supposed to be recited several times a day, so the most important commandment isn’t a rule, an issue, or a cause, but a prayer. Loving God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength means to love Him with all that we have and are.
I believe that our society constantly tells us that God is second. Many will say the environment is first. Politicians may say that the economy is first; the media may say anti-racism is first. In school, it seems there are more important things to learn than about God. Maybe at home, we think family comes first. People say things like, ‘If you don’t have health, what do you have?’ So, our whole culture tells us God is second, second, second.
Let me be clear: Care for the environment and the economy are very important, but more important is care for the human person, and even more important is love for God.
It’s interesting that Jesus was only asked about one great commandment but then He adds another, “The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these’” (12:30). He draws a connection between loving God and others: There’s one commandment but with two parts. So, the Christian intuition is that, if we love God more, we’ll love others more, and then take care of the stranger, then our country, and then the environment. However, if we don’t love God, we’ll eventually lose love for other people.
Have you heard of the college ethics question: If your pet or a stranger is drowning, whom will you save first? As people’s belief in God decreases, more and more people are responding that they’ll save their pet first. Yet, no Christian could ever say that. Because each human person is made in the image of God, we would always save a stranger over an animal.
The notion of human rights came out of Judeo-Christian culture (Fr. Robert Spitzer, Ten Universal Principles, 52 ff). Obviously, there have been many people throughout history who advocated for treating people well, but they didn’t have the notion of a right, meaning that something is due them simply because of who they are. By definition, rights can’t be given by other people or the government, because if they’re given by other people, those people can take the right away. But, if a right is given by God, no one can take it away.
We’ve seen this play out historically: Atheistic communism and socialism have been responsible for over 94 million deaths in the world.
Here’s another historical example: Overpopulation has been a concern for decades. The Church has never had an official position on this issue, but would give moral principles such as: if we have a population crisis, we can’t use abortion and sterilization to fix it; also, in whatever we do, we shouldn’t see humans as problems (we can’t call them parasites or cancers), but see them as made in the image of God. China, for example, used to have their one-child policy which did great harm to the human person, but, now that decades have passed, it has reversed this policy because they no longer have too many people but too few young people. Europe used to be Christian, but, as it became more secular, its focus has been less on God and more on humans, but, funny enough, there’s been an increased attitude that humans are a problem and we need less of them. However, in 2020, the United Nations reported that two-thirds of European countries are now trying to increase fertility rates.
Here is a five-minute video about overpopulation. It doesn’t answer every question, but its main contribution is a pro-human attitude, the idea that, if we honour the human person, things will work out. It’s similar to the Christian principle that, if we get God right, then we’ll get humans right, and things will work out. Here’s the video:
The Catholic faith loves the world but keeps on saying God first. Here are a few examples: When we look at the ten commandments, the first three have to do with loving God, the last seven with loving our neighbour. When we look at the Our Father, the first three petitions are all about honouring God, the last four about loving each other. For Catholics, we do funerals, not celebrations of life, because the focus is not on the deceased, but on Jesus’ Death and Resurrection, which offers that person eternal life. When we do weddings, sorry, but it’s not about you. It’s about Jesus, because if you have Him in your life, you’ll have a better marriage since you’ll have to treat your spouse better. The Church teaches that Catholics are obliged to go to Mass every Sunday because God deserves the first day of the week, and, also here in Canada, Catholics are obliged to go to Mass on December 25 and January 1.
In three weeks, we have our Christ the King Challenge and we ask if we’ve made Jesus the center of our lives, and, if not, would we like Him to be. Today in the pews, you’ll find the cards that we hope to fill out on November 24, 2024, and they’re there early just so that we have clarity about what we’re asking.
Jesus has made us the centre of His life. When we look at the crucifix, we see that Jesus made God the Father first and us second, and that the two are connected. Jesus’ teaching implies that the most important issue in the world is how much we love God, that He comes first.