Love and the first Commandment

The text today from the Roman Catholic Lectionary tells of the marriage of Tobiah to Sarah. Eileen Wirth is inspired by this passage of the Hebrew Testament to encourage us to address our difficulties in life through prayer. In the Gospel from Mark, Jesus reminds the scribe who questions Him of the Shema prayer of Israel in which the faithful declare love for God with all their human faculties. As Jesus declares, this Love of God becomes Love of neighbour as we live to fulfill the will of God for our joy and peace. In the heat of summer like conditions in Rome, we set off on Wednesday morning to St Peters for the Papal Audience. The congestion on the public transit system on Wednesday mornings is one of the aggravations for native Romans as tens of thousands of pilgrims make their way to the Vatican. In our time, security forces have much influence over public events where tourists and pilgrims gather. We were unable to join the crowd which had asssembled near the entrance to the Basilica much earlier, but from our vantage point we could see the couples in wedding clothes who were receiving a special blessing from Papa Francesco. This resonance with the text from Tobit continued as we went for lunch in the Rome Ghetto an area in which Jews were locked by Papal Decree which began in the 16th Century. The contrasts in Rome continue to be salient points of our visit. Prayer in one of the ancient Churches during the heat of the day is a counterpoint to evidence of attitudes of separation between Roman and tourist, rich and poor and Christian and Jew.