31st Sunday of Ordinary Time – B
November 3, 2024 8:30am
Our Lady of Grace Parish, Parkton
The Escalator
Some years ago, a woman named Margery Guest, Margery Guest, wrote an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer.
She tells of an experience shopping in a Philadelphia department store. Mrs. Guest had just boarded the “down” escalator.
As she began moving down, she noticed a woman to her right standing at the escalator railing up on the floor she had just left. This elderly woman looked afraid, and Mrs. Guest called out, “Do you need some help?”
The woman said softly, “I’m afraid.” Margery Guest responded, “Want me to come back up and get you?”
The distressed woman nodded “Yes!” Mrs. Guest returned by the “up” escalator and took the older woman by the arm.
As they began to step onto the “down” escalator, the woman said, “I don’t think I can do it.” Margery Guest reassured her: “I know we can do it. I can hold on to you.”
Together, arm in arm, they stepped onto the escalator and made their way to the bottom. “I am so grateful” the woman began.
“It was nothing,” Mrs. Guest replied, “I was happy to do it.” And, as Margery Guest writes in her article, “happy” is the right word.
She writes: “Sometimes I feel like I do very little to help others. When I helped this woman, I felt pure and whole, purposeful and happier than I had in weeks.”
The Commandments of Love
That article helps us to appreciate the impact of Jesus’ teaching today.
It is in the love and kindness that we extend to one another that we most resemble God. We become what we were created to be in the first place.
This is why when we live out of this love for others, we are most in touch with God and with ourselves at the same time. That was the experience of Margery Guest when she says that she felt whole and pure, purposeful and happy when helping that elderly woman.
A Closing Saying
A lot more could be said about Jesus’ two great commandments, but I will stop with this.
I came across a brief saying which, I think, summarizes the point in the article that I have quoted. The saying is by an unknown author, and it is simply this:
“I sought my soul, but my soul I could not see.
I sought my God, but my God eluded me.
I sought my neighbor, and I found all three.”
There is a lot of wisdom here and it unlocks at least some of the meaning of Jesus’ commandments of love. So, I leave that with you:
“I sought my soul, but my soul I could not see.
I sought my God, but my God eluded me.
I sought my neighbor, and I found all three.”
