Guard your thoughts and desires…

FRIENDS and SERVANTS of the WORD

14 JUNE 2024   FRIDAY 10

WORD of the DAY 
Jesus said to his disciples: “You have heard that it was said, You shall not commit adultery.
But I say to you, everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one of your members than to have your whole body thrown into Gehenna. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one of your members than to have your whole body go into Gehenna. “It was also said, Whoever divorces his wife must give her a bill of divorce. But I say to you, whoever divorces his wife (unless the marriage is unlawful) causes her to commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery.” (Matthew 7: 27-32)

How shall I live this Word?   

A look “beyond”. This is what Jesus proposes to us today. It is not just a “beyond” compared to the commandments; it is a look at the set of commandments themselves. In fact, “do not covet” is already part of the Decalogue, but perhaps it is not given the same importance of the other commandments. It is for this reason that perhaps Jesus, beyond a “beyond” that calls intentions into question, recalls the entire law, which already has a comparison with oneself, not only with concrete actions. The result is a deep, strong, integral request for authenticity. We are followers of Jesus with all of ourselves. Any way of following the law that leaves out some part of the human, or that stops at pure fact, without questioning the chain of desires that precede it, is in reality not authentic. We follow Him in facts, but also in intentions, in those looks, desires, sensations, which in some way “certify” from within that He is the very Lord of our life, who I want to follow, love, and for whom love. His request is not superficial, banal, just as nothing about Him is, nor about what He proposes to us for our true happiness.

I will identify on which occasion I followed the law” without questioning the quality of the desire.

The voice of Hermann Hesse   Writer

Happiness is love, nothing else. Happy is the one who knows how to love. Love is every movement of our soul in which it feels itself and perceives its own life. Happy are, therefore, those capable of loving much. But loving and desiring are not the same thing. Love is desire become wisdom; love does not want to possess; it just wants to love.

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