Dear parishioners, visitors & friends,
The drama between Christ and some of the Jewish leaders appears to be unending. They are quite determined to trap Jesus. The gospel of this weekend says that when the Pharisees heard that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, they got together and to disconcert Jesus, one of them put forward the question, ‘Master, which is the greatest commandant of the law?’ Their malicious intent is glaringly obvious. They want to trap Jesus into making a damaging statement against the law. Jesus cuts the ground from under their feet with His response. The verse Jesus quoted was part of the Shema, the basic and essential creed of Judaism, the sentence with which every Jewish child commits to memory. The Shema is like the Christian ‘Sign of Cross’, because every Jewish service opens with it. There are about 613 commandments, which, in theory, are supposed to be observed with the same seriousness. However, in reality there are distinctions among the laws. There are higher laws and lesser commandments. Almost all the Jewish orthodox group vary in their understanding of the laws and their degree of observances. Jesus surprised all the orthodox Jewish groups when He summarised the entire law into ‘love of God and love of neighbour’. The first part of Jesus’ response comes from the Book of Deuteronomy (6:5), which is central to Jewish faith: “You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind.” Jesus puts our love for God as the first of all the commandments. This means that to love God, we must give a total and undivided loyalty to God. Our love of God should dominate our emotions, directs our thoughts and feelings and should be the driving force of all our actions. Love of God is simply living a life that shows itself in total commitment and devotion to God. Following from the love of God is our love for our fellow human beings. ‘You must love your neighbour as yourself,’ (Leviticus 19:18). Our love of God and the love of our fellow human beings are closely interwoven. The tangible proof of our love for God is in the love we show to our fellow human beings. The order of the commandments is our love for God first followed by our love for our fellow human beings. God is love, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God (1 John 4:7). It is only when we have first known God and love God, that we can love our fellow human beings. Human beings are not an amalgamation of chemical substances or mere objects. We are all sons and daughters of God and we are all created in God’s image and likeness. Jesus did something quite radical when He summed up the whole commandments into love of God and love of neighbour. These two commandments are not new to the Jewish laws. However, what was new was what Jesus did when He amalgamated what used to be two different and distinct laws. Jesus made them one. “Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them,” (Matthew 5:17). Love of God and love of neighbour can no longer be observed as two separate laws. Jesus has made them one and the same. One cannot happen without the other. We cannot claim to love God when we struggle to love all human beings who are made in God’s image and likeness. In our journey of faith, may our need for love spring from our love for God and flow on into our love for our fellow human beings.
God bless you all.
Fr. John Ikechukwu Echewodo
Parish Priest
St Mary's Parish is committed to the introduction of the Alpha programme.
Christmas 2018 Mass Schedule 
