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Which is the first of all the commandments?

To which Jesus responds, “Love of God.” And the second is like it: “Love your neighbor.”

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In Jesus’ time, there were two major schools of thought. 

Some Jews wanted to expand the Law as much as possible. They were meticulous and exceptionally detailed, so much so that they created 613 rules to follow in addition to the 10 Commandments!

Others treated the Law like an accordion. They wanted to collapse it down to its very essence.

It’s this approach that Jesus takes. He collapses the Law like an accordion down into a single word: love.

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But what exactly is love?

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Love’s a bit like humility; it’s hard to define. But you know it when you see it. You know it when you feel it. 

And you know it when you don’t.

Throughout the centuries, poets like Dante have tried to define love with varying degrees of success. For example, he once wrote, “Love is what moves the sun and the other stars.” 

Nice, but a bit too abstract to me. 

Shakespeare, on the other hand, got it right.

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In one of the most famous scenes from Romeo and Juliet, a young Juliet gazes down upon Romeo from her balcony and says to him:

“Romeo, the more I give to you, the more I seem to have.”

The more I give…the more I have. That’s the very essence of love.

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Married couples and parents know this well. Think of how delighted you are when you see your children succeed. You sacrifice so much in order to make their futures brighter.

Or the delight teachers experience when they teach their students how to read.

Or the sense of satisfaction we have when giving the perfect gift.

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If Juliet is right, the more we give to anyone, the happier we become. 

This is why Jesus says that love fulfills the Law; it’s the force that moves the sun and the other stars. It’s the force that keeps families – and society – together.

Now, more than ever, we’re being called to put these commandments into practice: Love God. Love your neighbor. 

The society we’re living in is the outcome of human choices and decisions. But there’s good news in that. 

What humans break, divide, and separate, we can – with God’s help – also heal, unite, and restore. 

Realizing this vision of Christ – where we live in a world of mutual love and respect – begins with a single person.

May that person be you. May that person be me.

The more we give to one another, the happier we become.

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The Holy Spirit is mysterious like the wind – invisible, but everywhere. 

We can feel the Spirit, we can see its effects, but we just can’t see what the Spirit looks like, which is why we use images to represent him.

In the Gospels, the Spirit is represented by a dove – a gentle, peaceful bird.

But in the Acts of the Apostles, the Spirit is represented by tongues of fire. 

Quite a difference!

The Irish bring the two together and depict the Holy Spirit as a goose, a wild bird with fire in its belly.

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Geese are fiery animals, wandering wherever they will.

If you try to contain them, they’ll bite! Your only warning before that painful pinch is a loud, jarring honk! We’ve all heard it – Honk! Honk! Honk!

Watch out!

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Like a feisty goose, the Holy Spirit moves wherever he wills. And when he “bites,” you know it! 

Whoever has a heart open to the Holy Spirit has felt the difference; they become like the God they represent – peaceful, and at times jarring, noisy, protective, passionate and courageous. 

Honk! Honk!

Impossible to ignore.

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Think of Mother Teresa, who left her home and her family, dedicating her entire life to the poorest of the poor.

She bandaged their wounds, washed their feet, fed the hungry, gave the sick and homeless a place to die.

She became so poor at one point she wrote in her diary, “I have nothing. Not even the consolation of God.”

And yet she got up every morning and continued the work she was called to do.

Then there’s Dorothy Day, a journalist and social activist, who lived above a soup kitchen in New York City for decades while fighting for human equality.

These – our peers – had the Holy Spirit within them. 

They had fire in their bellies.

Honk! Honk!

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Like Mother Teresa and Dorothy Day, anyone who’s been baptized has received the Holy Spirit. 

But do we have the same fire in our bellies? Are we as active in living out our Christian faith?

Or, like the disciples in today’s Gospel, are we still waiting to be sent?

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This was a period of hard transition for the disciples. They’d experienced Jesus’ death and resurrection, but they were still filled with grief, afraid of the future. 

They needed Jesus to send the fire of his Spirit upon them.

And he does. “Peace be with you,” he says. “As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”

The mission is clear. The disciples must leave that locked inner room in Jerusalem, face their peers, and preach the Gospel to the ends of the earth. 

Before Pentecost, they were like us at times – timid, fearful, bound by grief.  

But after the Spirit rushed upon them, they were transformed; unstoppable like wild geese, preaching to the ends of the earth with fire in their bellies. 

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The same was true for Mother Teresa, Dorothy Day – and can be for us. Whenever we open our hearts to the Holy Spirit, something new, something bold, something unexpected happens. 

Maybe our heart softens, allowing us to forgive someone who’s hurt us deeply.

Maybe we part with some of our prized possessions, giving them to the poor or unemployed. 

Maybe we take a bigger risk for God.

Think of the thousands of healthcare workers who’ve voluntarily fought COVID. Or those who’ve embarked on a faith-centered career, spent time as a missionary, discerned religious life, or gotten involved in lay leadership in the Church. 

The possibilities are endless. But the experience is the same. Whenever the Spirit “bites,” we’re moved beyond our comfort zones, challenged to do something new.

Something bold.

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This is the message of Pentecost. The Holy Spirit is our Advocate, the one sent to reawaken our hearts to the original message of Jesus:

… a message that challenges us to be reconciled with one another; that urges us to part with our ego, to work for peace, to be generous, to love and serve the weakest among us.

As Dorothy Day wrote while living above that soup kitchen in New York, “Christians are commanded to live in a way that doesn’t make sense unless God exists.” 

Do we live that way, like our lives doesn’t make sense…unless God exists?

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Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful, enkindle in us the fire of your love… And we shall renew the face of the earth. 

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Imagine how shocked one spouse would feel to hear the other questioned their love.

Or how hurt a best friend would be to hear the other question their loyalty.

It could be deeply hurtful.

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In the Gospel, Jesus does just that. He questions Peter’s loyalty, then his love, asking him three times, “Peter, do you love me?”

Peter’s desperate, wholehearted response is one every Christian should aspire to say:

“Lord, Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.”

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“Lord, Lord.”

In Latin, “Domine, Domine.”

It’s from the Latin word, Domine, that we get the word, dominate.

Lord, Lord…Domine, Domine…dominate.

To dominate means to be the central figure; to have a commanding influence over something or someone.

What Peter’s saying, then, is that Jesus is the most important person in his life; he is the central figure, the commanding influence. 

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This is the type of devotion Peter must have in order to continue following Jesus.

Jesus has empowered him to be the chief shepherd of the Church, and will eventually lead Peter to offer his life as a witness to our faith.

Perhaps we should ask ourselves the same: Who or what is the center of my life?

Is it me? A friend? A spouse? Or the Lord?

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Lord, Lord, Domine, Domine, you know everything; you know that I love you. You are the center of my life. 

Peter’s words are challenging. But they’re the words every Christian should aspire to say, not only with our lips, but also with our lives.

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