Doing the Will of God:
Memorial of Saint Thomas Aquinas
(Hebrews 10:1-10; Ps 40; Mk 3:31-35)
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A well-to-do lawyer was visiting St. Mother Teresa’s clinic in Calcutta. Observing her ministering to rejected and dying patients, some of them smelling awful and covered with sores, he made this comment, “Sister, I wouldn’t do that for a million dollars.” Mother Teresa replied serenely, “Neither would I.”
Today’s readings reflect that same sentiment – we are to do what we do because it is the will of God, and not for any other earthly gain or even out of a sense of duty.
The first reading from Hebrews is clear in exposing the limits of the law, how powerless it is to change hearts, regardless of how many laws there are, and how strictly they may or not be enforced. The law of official Judaism was only a pale shadow of the power of the love of God manifested by Jesus, who had only one priority throughout all his ministry – to do the will of God.
That is our call. Realizing how loved we are by a loving God, can we be like Jesus, and strive to make doing the will of the Father our priority?
This begs the question – what is the will of God for us all? I would summarize that as follows: First, we are to keep the commandments (Love God with our whole being, including lively worship; love others as we love ourselves; love others the way Jesus loved us, and love our enemies). Second, we are to live the Beatitudes, the heart of Jesus’s new moral code (to be poor in spirit, to mourn our losses; to be gentle, to be merciful, to seek justice, to work for peace, to be pure of heart, and to accept persecution for the sake of truth). Third, we are to practice the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, especially reaching out to help the poor and those less fortunate them ourselves.
Hebrews points out that all this is to come from our transformed hearts, not out of a sense of duty or proscription. It must be a free response to the love that God in Jesus has bestowed on us. When I joined the international singing group Up With People, I resolved that I would not smoke, drink or date while with them, especially as I was considering a call to religious life and priesthood at that time. When I arrived where they were staging for Europe, I discovered they had three rules: no smoking, drinking or dating! With joy I realized that I did not need those rules (which other cast members were struggling to keep) because I had already committed to them in my heart.
A grade eleven student once asked me why we Catholics “worship Mary when Jesus pushed her and his family away when they wanted to see him.” Realizing she was referring to today’s gospel, I gently replied that she may be mis-interpreting that passage. What Jesus was doing was not pushing his mother away, but rather honoring his mother, who had physically given birth to him. The message of Jesus to us all is that we can be closer to him spiritually, than he is to his mother physically, if we do the will of the Father as he did.
Today the church honors St. Thomas Aquinas, who had one of the greatest minds in the history of the Church, and who lived this gospel. Thomas was born near Aquino, Italy, about 1225. From an early age he posed questions of great theological depth; his family sent him at the age of five to be educated by the Benedictines in Monte Cassino. While his family was pious, they did not approve when 19-year-old Thomas joined the newly formed Dominicans, going as far as to imprison Thomas in the family castle. Once released, he studied in Italy and Germany, where, ironically, some of his classmates named this great thinker “the dumb ox,” a name which prompted his teacher, Albert the Great, to proclaim: “We call him the dumb ox, but in his teaching he will one day produce such a bellowing that it will be heard throughout the world.”
With Albert, he developed the theological Scholastic method which dominated Catholic teaching for centuries. A prodigious writer, his most famous work is the Summa Theologica, one of the greatest examples of theological thought ever composed. Many of his hymn texts, such as Pange Lingua, Tantum Ergo and Adore Te Devote, are still used today. A man of towering intellect, Thomas was also a humble mystic. He died in 1274, was canonized in 1323, and declared a Doctor of the Church in 1567. In 1880, he was proclaimed a patron saint of universities and schools.
Thomas was able to plant a seed of truth-seeking that enable the works of the greatest philosopher of ancient times, the pagan Aristotle, to become accepted in the Western Christian world, even though that work was coming mostly from Muslim sources. His simple principle was that truth does not contradict truth, so if the teachings of Aristotle rang true to Christian belief, then they must be true and acceptable.
The Eucharist is made possible only by Jesus’ acceptance of the will of God for him, to reveal to us the depth of the Father’s love for all humanity.
May our celebration today strengthen our faith in God’s love for us, and empower us to do the will of God, freely and joyfully, as did St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta.
