NINETEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST
The fundamental and original commandment is to love. It is a small word, yet it expresses an all-embracing act. It is easy to say, “Love,” but it is not easy to attain the necessary measure of love. Nor is it entirely clear how this may be accomplished.
For this reason, the Savior surrounds this commandment with other explanatory rules: “Love your neighbor as yourself”; “And just as you want men to do to you, you also do to them likewise” (Luke 6:31).
The measure of love indicated here is, one might say, boundless. For is there any limit to our love for ourselves? Is there any good that we would not wish others to do for us?
Nevertheless, this commandment is not impossible to fulfill, as it may seem at first glance. The whole matter consists in attaining perfect compassion for others, in reaching a state in which we take their feelings into ourselves and feel what they feel.
Once we attain this, there will no longer be any need for someone to tell us what we ought to do for others in each particular situation. The heart itself will show us.
But as soon as we strive to cultivate this feeling within ourselves, selfishness immediately approaches, seeking to turn us back toward ourselves and imprison us within our own selves. Then it becomes difficult even to lift a finger for another person. We have no concern for him, even if he is at the point of death.
When the Lord said, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” He intended that our neighbor should enter into us in place of ourselves—that is, into our very heart.
But if, as before, nothing dwells there except our own “I,” then do not expect anything good.
+ St. Theophan the Recluse - Thoughts for Every Day of the Year