Spirituality of the Readings

A Love We Can Understand

Glory.

We will hear about it in Sunday’s Gospel. God will be glorified and will glorify Jesus.

But most of us admit that we do not understand what it means to “give glory” to God or to Jesus.

Let’s look.

The word glory has been defined as “very great praise, honor, or distinction bestowed by common consent.”

I was at a concert a number of years ago in which the audience gave unrestrained, wild approbation to three performers, all of it deserved. We thundered appreciation and shouted and whistled after every song in a two and a half hour concert. The performers were not much past twenty years old, but they had complete musical mastery. Half way through the concert I noticed that, without intending to, I had been smiling the whole time.

When at last they tried to close the concert, the audience threatened to mob them. One of the performers called out, “everyone deserves this experience! We are going to line up the whole audience and each of you gets to come up here and have everybody go crazy over you!”

Maybe so, but would we deserve it? Members of Nickel Creek (the group I have been speaking about) had written a song that might show the real meaning of glory. It is called “The Hand Song.”* Here is the story.

A young boy breaks off some garden roses for his mother. Trouble is, she has been tending these roses with great care, and he has pulled them to pieces. The thorns dig into his hands as he brings his present to her. She lovingly extracts these thorny reminders of her roses,

and she knew it was love.
It was one she could understand.
He was showing his love
and that’s how he hurt his hands.

Some time later, held close on her lap, the boy listened to stories from the bible. He saw a picture of Jesus and cried out, Momma, he’s got some scars just like me!

And he knew it was love.
It was one he could understand.
He was showing his love
and that’s how he hurt his hands.

Finally grown up, the young man was called by Uncle Sam. His “number” was drawn, and he threw himself in front of a friend to shield him from gunfire. He gave his life, a deed he had learned from the roses and the cross.

And they knew it was love.
It was one they could understand.
He was showing his love,
and that’s how he hurt his hands.

Did the boy/man earn “glory” in the usual sense of the word? He learned what love was and he gave it on the battlefield. It is a small story, with no stadiums of people to give applause.

And yet, isn’t love the very essence of human life? Jesus says so in this Sunday’s Gospel:

I give you a new commandment:
love one another.
As I have loved you,
so you also should love one another.

It is a love we can understand.

Jesus shows it without reserve on the cross. It hurts his hands, it takes his life. The beauty of the pain and death he undertook for others is filled with quiet glory.

Can we love each other in this way?

We may hurt our hands.

But we will be enclosed in his glory.

John Foley, SJ

**From Saint Louis University