By Colleen O’Sullivan
Naomi said, “See now! Your sister-in-law has gone back to her
people and her god. Go back after your
sister-in-law!” But Ruth said, “Do not
ask me to abandon or forsake you! For
wherever you go, I will go, wherever you lodge I will lodge, your people shall
be my people, and your God my God.” Thus
it was that Naomi returned with the Moabite daughter-in-law, Ruth, who
accompanied her back from the plateau of Moab.
They arrived in Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest. (Ruth 1:15-16, 22)
“Teacher, which commandment in the law is the
greatest?” He said to him, “You shall
love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all
your mind. This is the greatest and the
first commandment. The second is like
it: You shall love your neighbor as
yourself.” (Matthew 22:36-39)
Piety
The
fatherless and the widow he sustains,
but the way
of the wicked he thwarts.
The Lord
shall reign forever;
your God, O
Zion, through all generations. Alleluia.
(Psalm
146:9bc-10)
Study
The Pharisees are back at one of their favorite pastimes in today’s
Gospel reading, attempting to trap Jesus into saying something they can use
against him. This time they want him to
name the greatest commandment. Jesus
instead tells them that the entire law and the prophets can be summed up very
simply: Love God with all your being and
love your neighbor as yourself. Do those
two things and all God’s commandments will be covered.
God doesn’t ask for our love in a vacuum. First, there is always God’s great love for
us. God hopes we will love him
back. In the first reading, we get a
feel for how the God of all the universe is also the God who cares greatly
about the nitty-gritty of our everyday lives.
There was a famine in the land which caused Naomi and her husband along
with their two sons to leave their home in Bethlehem and go to live in Moab. Naomi’s husband died at some point, leaving
her a widow. Both sons, who had married
Moabite women, also died ten years later.
How alone she must have felt! She
had lost all her immediate family. She
had no grandchildren, just two brokenhearted daughters-in-law. Naomi found herself in a land that wasn’t
hers with no one to take care of her.
She heard one day that back home God had brought the famine to an
end. Naomi decided that she would
undertake the journey home.
Naomi knew it would be best for her sons’ widows to stay where they had
family, but Ruth truly loved her mother-in-law. She said she would go with Naomi, she would
become one of Naomi’s people, she would even love and worship the God of
Israel! In this story of human love, we
see reflected the type of love God has for all of us Just as the God Ruth chose to embrace never
leaves us, neither would she ever leave this woman whom she had grown to
love. She fulfilled God’s desire that we
love one another.
If you have a chance to read the rest of the story, you’ll see that one
of the overall messages is that God never meets an outsider. God’s goodness knows no boundaries, national
or otherwise. Ruth came from people for
the most part despised by the Israelites, yet God ultimately arranged for her
to become the great-grandmother of King David and, therefore, part of Jesus’
family tree as outlined in Matthew’s Gospel.
Action
This week, reflect on some time in your life when you have felt God’s
presence in the nitty gritty of your days, and give thanks. Then pick one person you know who is lonely
or is carrying a heavy burden, and extend the love of God by doing something
kind for him or her.
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