by Fr Zweli Ngwenya
Dear friends we have just celebrated the suffering, death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ. I hope we had wonderful and spiritually fulfilling celebrations which in our minds are now over and we will see them again next year. Maybe some of us have already started doing evaluations, looking for points of improvement for next year. One important thing is that the Christ event should never be over in our lives. The Christ event is the greatest gift of love, life and service. Today we are a community of the baptised because Jesus loved us, he gave us new life and he taught us to serve both God and our neighbour.
The commandment to love is the greatest commandment without which there is no Christianity. I understand that the word LOVE is the most abused word in today’s world. We need to ask ourselves now and again; what is Love? Simply put love can be defined as the gift of life for the other. Love creates and develops the life of the other. Love donates that which one possesses for the sake of the other. Jesus Christ possessed the fullness of grace and of truth and this is what he donated to us. He possessed life and power and these gifts he donated to us. He possessed a father and a mother and he donated them to us. He possessed the Holy Spirit and he donated him to us. He possessed a body and blood and he gave them to us in the Eucharist. This is how Jesus loved – he gave it all for us.
Dear friends we have been loved and we in turn need to love. Love ought to create and to develop the life of the other. We cannot, therefore, love if we do not know how to serve. We cannot serve if in the first place we have our own interests. I think this is the right time to ask ourselves the following questions:
• Why are there so many disputes amongst us?
• Why are there so many disputes in our Parish communities?
• Why are there so many disputes in sodalities?
The answer to these and to other similar questions is that our concept of love and service is distorted. We are no longer interested in creating and developing the spiritual, human, moral, intellectual lives of others but we are interested in attaining glory for ourselves and in leaving a legacy. Jesus never focused in attaining glory for himself neither in leaving a legacy. He focused on love and service and indeed at the end he attained everlasting glory and indeed a legacy was left behind. Beloved Christians, we need to remember that this world is not a place of glory but it is a place of service. Let us not allow ourselves to be diverted from the true Christian way by the movements who have placed glory, wealth, fame, and power at the centre of Christianity. We as Catholics we know that our Christian life is not based on glory, fame, power, and wealth but it is based on love and service. He who searches for his own glory will serve little but he who gives himself totally for service knows that he will get his glory in Heaven. As we continue to walk in the light of the risen Christ let us continue to love and to serve one another in truth.