The Hour of Love

What does real love look like? Jeff explores Pope Leo XIV's inaugural message that emphasizes the importance of love in today's world. Jeff discusses the different Greek words for love—Phileo, Storge, Eros, and Agape—and highlights the profound impact of Agape love. He reflects on 1 Corinthians 13 to bring out the biblical understanding of love and connects it to our everyday relationships. 

Snippet from the Show

True love rises above problems, conflict, and everything that divides us.

Shownotes

Excerpts from Homily of Pope Leo XIV during the Mass of Inauguration of the Petrine Ministry

Saint Augustine wrote: “Lord, you have made us for yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in you” (Confessions, I: 1,1).

The death of Pope Francis filled our hearts with sadness. In those difficult hours, we felt like the crowds that the Gospel says were “like sheep without a shepherd” (Mt 9:36). Yet on Easter Sunday, we received his final blessing and, in the light of the resurrection, we experienced the days that followed in the certainty that the Lord never abandons his people, but gathers them when they are scattered and guards them “as a shepherd guards his flock” (Jer 31:10).

Successor of Peter, the Bishop of Rome, a shepherd capable of preserving the rich heritage of the Christian faith and, at the same time, looking to the future, in order to confront the questions, concerns, and challenges of today’s world. 

Accompanied by your prayers, we could feel the working of the Holy Spirit, who was able to bring us into harmony, like musical instruments, so that our heartstrings could vibrate in a single melody. 

Love and unity: these are the two dimensions of the mission entrusted to Peter by Jesus. 

 Walking along the shore, he had called Peter and the other first disciples to be, like him, “fishers of men”. 

How can Peter carry out this task? The Gospel tells us that it is possible only because his own life was touched by the infinite and unconditional love of God, even in the hour of his failure and denial.

Consequently, when Jesus asks Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” (Jn 21:16), he is referring to the love of the Father. It is as if Jesus said to him, “Only if you have known and experienced this love of God, which never fails, will you be able to feed my lambs. Only in the love of God the Father will you be able to love your brothers and sisters with that same ‘more’, that is, by offering your life for your brothers and sisters.”

Peter is thus entrusted with the task of “loving more” and giving his life for the flock. The ministry of Peter is distinguished precisely by this self-sacrificing love, because the Church of Rome presides in charity, and its true authority is the charity of Christ. It is never a question of capturing others by force, by religious propaganda, or by means of power. Instead, it is always and only a question of loving as Jesus did.

“In the harmony of the Spirit, in the coexistence of diversity.” ( We are not called to go through his homilies and writings and pick out what we like and don’t like; we are called to contemplate and meditate on what has been given to us. )

In the words of Saint Augustine: “The Church consists of all those who are in harmony with their brothers and sisters and who love their neighbour” (Serm. 359,9).

Welcome his word that enlightens and consoles! 

This is the missionary spirit that must animate us; not closing ourselves off in our small groups, nor feeling superior to the world. We are called to offer God’s love to everyone, in order to achieve that unity which does not cancel out differences but values the personal history of each person and the social and religious culture of every people.

Brothers and sisters, this is the hour for love!… With my predecessor Leo XIII, we can ask ourselves today: If this criterion “were to prevail in the world, would not every conflict cease and peace return?” (Rerum Novarum, 21).

Scripture References

The Gift of Love

13 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. ² And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. ³ If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned,^[a] but have not love, I gain nothing.

⁴ Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; ⁵ it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ⁶ it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. ⁷ Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

⁸ Love never ends; as for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹ For our knowledge is imperfect and our prophecy is imperfect; ¹⁰ but when the perfect comes, the imperfect will pass away. ¹¹ When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became a man, I gave up childish ways. ¹² For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall understand fully, even as I have been fully understood. ¹³ So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Additional References

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