Being “Abel” to Love God on Valentine’s Day

Today’s Mass readings remind us of the importance of loving God. How appropriate that they happen to fall on Valentine’s Day, for God’s love, poured out in the blood and water flowing from the Sacred Heart of Jesus, is the greatest experience of love we can ever hope to know. And such love can only be repaid with love. But stepping into the arena of love has it’s dangers, and this is even true in the relationship between God and humanity.

Daring to love can incite jealousy. The First Reading, from Genesis, speaks of the offering of Abel, firstborn son of Adam, made for love of God. This gift was far more pleasing to God than that of Abel’s brother, Cain. We all know what happened: Cain, in a fit of jealousy, murdered his own brother. The Church Fathers remind us that Abel was a type, or prefigurement, of Christ: he, like Jesus, was a shepherd (cf. John 10); he offered a sacrifice acceptable to the Lord (Jesus’ offering was his very self on the cross); and his blood was shed on the ground as he was murdered. The jealousy of the religious establishment of his day contributed to Jesus’ death.

Daring to love can also mean risking rejection. Today’s Gospel portrays Jesus as a sort of jilted lover:

The Pharisees came forward and began to argue with Jesus,
seeking from him a sign from heaven to test him.
He sighed from the depth of his spirit and said,
“Why does this generation seek a sign?
Amen, I say to you, no sign will be given to this generation.”
Then he left them, got into the boat again,
and went off to the other shore.

– Mark 8:11-13

Truth be told, Jesus had already given more than enough signs by this point: healings, exorcisms, miracles. Just think of the feeding miracles! Just before this incident recorded in Mark 8, Jesus had fed 4,000 people (not counting the women and children), with seven loaves and a few small fish. Dinner and a show, as it were, perfect for Valentine’s day!

But the constant demand for miracles caused Jesus to sigh with deep disappointment. I’m sure at that point he felt a lot like a lover who is being used by his beloved. We have to love Jesus Christ for who he is, not what he can do for us. The constant demand for the miraculous indicates a selfishness and superficiality in the relationship, always asking for more proof of love when more than enough evidence exists already.

In the parallel account of this event in Matthew, Jesus says, “An evil an adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale’s belly, so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth” (Mt 12:40). “Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends” (John 15:13). That Jesus died for our sins and rose again should be proof enough of his love for us. For our part, we only need to remember that love can only be repaid with love. And love is deeds, not words.