Mary loved her neighbor, Mary: Day 045

Last updated on: September 4, 2015 at 3:30 am by Pete Socks

Mary loved her neighbor, Mary: Day 045 2015-08-22T07:34:57-05:00 Pete Socks

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Mary loved her neighbor

Genuine love for God leads inevitably to love for neighbor. St. Alphonsus points out that just as Mary loved God perfectly, she loved her neighbor perfectly.

Love toward God and love toward our neighbor are commanded by the same precept: “And this commandment we have from him, that he who loves God should love his brother also” (1 Jn 4:21). St. Thomas says the reason for this is that whoever loves God, loves all that God loves.
This truth was confirmed for St. Catherine of Genoa one day when she prayed, “Lord, you will that I should love my neighbor. Yet I can love no one but you.”

God answered her in these words: “All who love me, love what I love.”

But just as there never was, and never will be, anyone who loved God as much as Mary loved him, so there never was, and never will be, anyone who loved her neighbor as much as she did. So great was Mary’s charity when she was on earth that she helped the needy without even being asked. That was the case at the marriage feast of Cana, when she told her Son that family’s distress: “They have no wine” (Jn 2:3) and asked him to work a miracle.

With what speed did she travel when there was possibility of relieving her neighbor! When she went to the house of Elizabeth to fulfill a charitable role, “Mary went with haste into the hill country” (Lk 1:39). Yet she could never dis- play more fully the greatness of her charity than she did in offering her Son up to death for our salvation. For this reason, St. Anselm exclaims, “Blessed among women, your purity surpasses that of the angels, and your compassion that of the saints!” —St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Glories of Mary

IN GOD’S PRESENCE, CONSIDER . . .
Based only on my attitudes and behavior toward them, would those around me have reason to conclude that I love God?

CLOSING PRAYER
From a prayer of Pope St. John Paul II: Mary, take from all our hearts the selfish- ness that sours relationships and keeps us centered only on ourselves. Give us hearts aflame with charity and filled with love. Make us, like the Apostle John who was commended to your care, loving children of our heavenly Father, conscious always of your maternal presence in our lives.

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