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| Leonard Whiting as Romeo and Olivia Hussey as Juliet in the 1968 film. |
(Thirtieth
Sunday of the Year (A): This homily was given on October 29, 2017 at St. Pius X
Church, Westerly, R.I., by Fr. Raymond Suriani.
Read Matthew 22: 34-40.)
[For the audio version of this homily, click here: Thirtieth Sunday 2017]
See
if you can figure out where these two quotes come from. I’ll give you a hint: They’re found in the
same well-known story:
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name
would smell as sweet.”
“Good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow, that I shall
say good night till it be morrow.”
If,
perchance, you don’t’ recognize those two lines, maybe this third one will
help: “O Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou
Romeo?”
That
clarifies the matter, I’m sure.
Those,
of course, are three short quotes from William Shakespeare’s classic play, Romeo and Juliet. The play tells the story of “star-crossed
lovers” (as Shakespeare calls them) who come from feuding families, but who still
manage to fall in love and secretly marry.
Then, to escape from her oppressive parents, who want her to marry
someone else, Juliet devises a plan to fake her own death and go off with
Romeo. She does this with the help of
the Friar who had married them secretly.
Most
of us know the rest of the story.
Friar
Laurence gives Juliet a special potion which makes her appear to be dead. She’s then put into the family crypt, which is
where Friar Laurence and Romeo are supposed to meet her after she wakes up, so
that she and Romeo can go away without anyone pursuing them, and live happily
ever after.
Unfortunately,
however, Romeo never gets the message that’s sent to him explaining the details
of the plan. So when he’s told that Juliet
has “died,” he thinks she’s really gone.
He decides at that point that life isn’t worth living without her, so he
buys some poison, drinks it, and dies next to her in the crypt. Juliet then wakes up, realizes what Romeo has
done, and decides that she can’t live without him either, so she takes her own
life by stabbing herself in the chest with Romeo’s dagger.
A
tragic ending, for sure—although the tragedy did finally stop the feud between
the two families.
Too
bad they waited so long to reconcile.
Now it’s
very clear from the way the story is written: Romeo loved Juliet. He loved her with all his heart and soul and mind and strength. And, by the same token, Juliet loved Romeo with all her heart and soul and mind and
strength.
AND
THAT WAS PRECISELY THEIR PROBLEM! That’s
precisely what was wrong in their relationship!
Which is why in the last line of the play Shakespeare wrote these words:
“For never was a story of more woe, than this of Juliet and her Romeo.”
Notice
that in today’s gospel Jesus makes a distinction—a very clear and a very
important distinction—between the way we’re supposed to love God and the way
we’re supposed to love other human beings.
They’re not the same! He says
we’re to love God (and only God!)
with all our heart and soul and mind and strength. We’re NOT supposed to love our neighbor in
that way. And this is true even if the
“neighbor” in question happens to be our husband or wife or parent or child or
brother or sister or best friend!
According
to Jesus, we’re supposed to love our neighbor as we love ourself. Which is an awful lot, by the way. To love is to “desire the good” for someone,
and most of us “desire the best” for ourselves in this life. Jesus is simply saying that we need to have
that same desire for everyone else on this earth—including our enemies.
Mixing
up these two commandments, like Romeo and Juliet did, is a big mistake. It’s a big mistake because other human
beings, even if they are very good, are weak and imperfect sinners: weak and
imperfect sinners who will most certainly disappoint us, and hurt us, and at
times maybe even abandon us.
And,
of course, they will all eventually die.
Only
God is always there for us; only God can be counted on never to abandon us, or
hurt us, or fail us—or die. This is why
our relationship with him (a relationship that’s nourished by daily prayer and
the sacraments) needs to be our number one priority in this life. You’ve heard me say that before; you’ve also
heard Fr. Najim say that many times since he became the pastor of St. Pius last
year.
And
here’s the very interesting irony: When we do grow in our knowledge and love of
God; when we do make the effort every day to love the Lord (and only the Lord!)
with all our heart and soul and mind
and strength, we love other people more, not less! Love of God doesn’t negate the love of
neighbor, it actually increases our love for our neighbor.
As I
was preparing this homily the person who came to mind in this regard was St.
Maximilian Kolbe—the priest who sacrificed his life to save a condemned prisoner
in the concentration camp at Auschwitz during the second World War.
I’m
sure most of us have heard the story before.
It happened near the
end of July in 1941, when someone from St. Maximilian’s cellblock escaped from
the camp. As soon as he found out about it, the Nazi commandant decided
that 10 other prisoners would be chosen at random and executed, in retaliation
for the one who had gotten away.
One of those chosen
was Francis Gajowniczek, a married man who had a young family. When he was
picked he fell to his knees and begged to be spared—for the sake of his wife
and children. It was then that St. Maximilian stepped forward and volunteered
to take his place.
And he did.
Now, if you know
anything at all about St. Maximilian Kolbe, you know that he loved Almighty
God a lot more than he loved any human being on this earth—including the members
of his own family. But it was precisely
that intense love for God that motivated him to demonstrate his love for
another human being—a person whom he didn’t even know!—in the most radical way
possible: by laying down his life for the man.
“Greater love than
this no one has, than to lay down his life for his friends.”
My
brothers and sisters, our world today is in desperate need of fewer Romeos and
Juliets, and of many more Maximilian Kolbes.
May we be among that number, by living these two great commandments as
they are written, as Jesus gave them to us: loving God—and only God—with ALL our heart and soul and mind and strength.
