So to the rest, there is laid up for me a crown of justice, which the Lord will render to me in that day (2 Tim: 18).
From the words of St. Augustine: Justice is love serving God alone. Perfect charity is perfect justice.
God is just, not once, not twice but all just. Both the law and the prophets bear witness to God's Justice (Rm. 3: 21). All men are now undeservedly justified by the gift God, through the redemption brought in Christ Jesus. Rm. 3: 24 The redemptive work Jesus is the awesome, mysterious, and eternal Justice of God.
Fr. Judge so often would lead the members of his community in prayer to the Holy Spirit, and to search for the truth in the Scriptures for the formation of their lives. The novena to the Holy Spirit was his favorite and became the Cenacle Novena.
Fr. Judge very consciously concentrated on the development of certain virtues. St. Vincent De Paul from whose spiritual vision Fr. Judge drew so much, had a distinct list of virtues that he recommended for the priests and brothers of Congregation of Mission. Fr. Judge practically counseled these same virtues in all his spiritual disciples both lay and religious. These virtues were: Humility, Charity, Justice, Sacrifice, and Self denial. Fr. Judge seemed to place particular emphasis on self-sacrifice, charity, justice, and humility.
Charity or Love of God is the very core of the spiritual universe. The love of God is the secret the inspiration of all good -the growth in the heart that brings about good works. Love grows as a result of good works and vice-versa, good works grow from the love of God. For Fr. Judge, there existed no more practical or speedy way of increasing in the love of God than developing that love for the poor, the needy, the sick, the abandoned, the abused, and on and on. From this very service of love the sacred humanity of Jesus is poured out. Why have I given this time to love or charity? Remember St. Augustine said, "Perfect charity is perfect justice."
Two questions - How did Jesus treat the poor and afflicted and the sinner in the society of His time? Or W W J D? What would Jesus do in this society today?
The Catechism of the Catholic Church states (Number 1803): A VIRTUE is an habitual and firm disposition to do the good. It allows the person not only to perform good acts, but to give the best of oneself And all virtues are acquired by human effort and these acts have h Divine Love - ' harmony with God. Love what is good and shun what is evil. Number 1805 of the New Catechism gives four virtues that play a pivotal role and accordingly are called " Cardinal"- all the others revolve around them. The four cardinal virtues are: Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, and Temperance.
Number 1087 of the New Catechism defines Justice thus: Justice is the moral virtue that consists in the constant and firm will to give our due to God and neighbor. Justice toward God is called the "virtue of religion". Justice toward Neighbor disposes one another to respect the rights of each other, to promote the common good for each other, and to establish in the human relationships the harmony that promotes equity with regard to persons and to the common good. The just man who serves justice, often mentioned in the Sacred Scriptures, is distinguished by habitual right thinking and uprightness of his conduct toward his neighbor. Colossians 4:1 "Masters, treat your slaves justly and fairly, realizing that you too have a Master in heaven".
The New Catechism (Number 2401) says " The seventh commandment forbids unjustly taking or keeping the goods of one's neighbor and wronging him in anyway with respect to his goods. It commands justice and charity in the care of earthly goods and the fruits of men's labor. Fr. Groeschel states that the cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude and temperance are moral virtues and truly Christian virtues when they are triggered, empowered, urged, and infused by the Holy Spirit.
Fr. Groeschel points to our symbol of Justice - the blind folded lady holding the scales to weigh justice. And what about our very Pledge Allegiance to the flag - " I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands - one nation under God - indivisible with liberty and justice for all". Fr. Groeschel says "Everyone has his due including God. The first three commandments what is due to God. The next seven commandments-what is due to neighbor.
LOVE GOD with ...
The big problem, comments Fr. Groeschel is that a secularized America says, "What God? God who?
With Vatican II but especially with the 1971 Synod's "Justice in the World" Justice became a call to the Christian from the God of the Two Testaments. The crucial point is this: When the prophet Micah declared to Israel, "What does the word require of you but to do Justice? (Mi 6:8) Biblical justice is fidelity. To what? To the demands of relationships that stem from a covenant with God. This web of relationships - king with people, judge with complainants, family with family members, community with each other, people with the land, and all of this because we have a covenant with God. Within such a setting, in what sense - does God's Justice prevail? Is God Just? When are you and I just? When we are in right relationships on three levels: to God, to God's people, to God's earth.
Such was the tradition on justice that sparked the ministry of Jesus. For Him the just man or woman is not primarily someone who gives to another what that other deserves. For Jesus, two commands sum up the just Christian: " You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart" (Mt. 22: 37). and "Love one another as I have loved you".
Mull over each relationship.
My relationship to God. Without God, I would not be. Were God to stop thinking of me, I would cease to be. Had not God's Son died for me, I would be hopelessly the slave of self, of sin, of Satan. Did not God live in me, I could not respond to God's love Did not the Eucharist feed me, I would starve spiritually. Little wonder that right relationship to God demands that I love God with ail my heart and mind, all my soul and strength.
My relationship to people. I am not self-sufficient. I need a mother a father to give me life, teachers without whom my ignorance would be monumental; farmers who grow what I eat to live, what I wear to work; priests to channel God's forgiveness to me; friends to share my joy and my grief, doctors to restore me to health; artists and preachers to lift my spirits. I need the Body of Christ, the Church, where no one can say to any other, "I have no need of you' (Cor. 12:21)
Look at our interdependence, many of us can relate to theologian Lawrence Cunningham's example, highly personal but very much our own story: "I sit at my word processor (assembled here in the U.S.A. with chips made in Japan) in a pair of Levis seven in Mexico while wearing a British brand of sneakers (Reeboks) which, a discreet tag inside informs. were manufactured in South Korea; for lunch I will eat a salad of vegetables crown in South Florida and harvested by a vast army of migrant workers who are Hispanic or contract workers from the Caribbean. The ordinary circumstances of my not uncomfortable life, in short, are dependent on a large number of people who are alien to me in culture, language and economic status."
Little wonder that right relationship to people demands Jesus' second command, the command he said "is like" loving God; "Love your neighbor as yourself '(Mt. 22:39). Love every man, woman and child like another self Love especially the less fortunate; love them as if you were standing in their shoes.
My relations to the earth, to things, to God's material creation. It's not simply an object outside of me. It's part of me; the air I breath; the food I eat; the sun that warms me and the breeze that cools me; the trees and flowers that delight me; the bluebird that sings to me; the rain and snow that provide me with water to drink, to bathe, to shave, to be baptized into Christ. Little wonder that right relationship to the earth demands reverence for a 'ft of God to be shared Generously rather than clutched possessively. Little wonder that it rejects what John Paul 11 called a culture of consumption or consumerism that makes us slaves of possession and involves so much throwing away and waste.
Listen, for this is biblical justice, your holiness and mine, your Christian spirituality-., right relationship to God, to people, to the earth.
Another way of phrasing it: What biblical Justice adds to the ethical and the legal is ...love
It's a fresh attitude altogether. It's not only giving others what they deserve; it's giving myself, to God, to people, to all of God's creation.
For your meditation on Justice, start with God's words to Israel in Isaiah: "Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to let the oppressed -o free, to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless into your house, when you see the naked to cover them, and to hide yourself from your own flesh?" (Is.58: 6-7)
Then link with Isaiah Jesus' own promise of what he will say to the Just on Judgment Day: "Come, you that are blessed by my Father, I was hungry and you gave me food; I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger and you welcomed me; I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me: I was in prison and you visited me. " And the Just will ask in wonder: When did we do all this? And the Lord will reply: "Just as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you did it to me. "(Mt. 25:' )4-40).
The least of these my brothers and sisters- have you ever lived like the least? I never felt what they feel. I was never painfully hungry or starving or a beggar or dressed in rags or slept on the street or sheltered in a dumpster or so very wet - cold and sick and no one cared for me or I was never an outcast in prison or all by myself at home and no friend visited me or raped or abused or had to consider an abortion. Who are they, the least?
And what of the rest of us who do not share such poverty or injustice like the least. We must begin with compassion. Not pity; for pity looks down on the suffering from some distant perch. Rather the compassion of Jesus. It simply means that we are genuinely human, that we feel deeply. It means that starving children and the AIDS afflicted, elderly neglected and women abused. African -.Americans discriminated against and refugees raped, strangers who speak a different language and convicted criminals not leave us cool, calm. and collected. If a man, woman, or child hurts, 1 hurt. But compassion is not enough. Imperative is the First Letter of John: "Let us love, not in word or speech alone, but in truth and action" (Jn.3:18). Concretely, each Catholic parish, to be genuinely Catholic. must come together to ask three questions: (I) What are the injustices in our area? Where do people hurt" (2) What resources can this parish command to attack these injustices. relieve such hurts? (3) Given these injustices and these resources, where shall we begin, what shall we do?
Here we are not simply social workers. We are living the first two commandments of the Mosaic law and the Christian Gospel: Love God above ail else, and love every man, woman, and child as an image of God (no matter how defaced the image); love each like another self, especially those who share more of Jesus' crucifixion than of his resurrection. Such is biblical justice, where the emphasis is not on what people deserve but on the monosyllable that says it all: love.
Several years ago at a gathering in Washington on human needs, a well educated gentleman rose to ask Cardinal James Hickey: "Why do we get involved in all this? We never ask these people who they are, what they believe, don't even ask them if they are Catholic.
A tough examination of conscience. How narrow is my love? Where do I say "Here
my love stops?" My answer will reveal how close I am to, or how far removed from, the love that drove God's Son to take our flesh, to grow as we grow, to tire and hunger; to touch the sores of lepers and the scars of sinners, to heal the broken and the condemned to die a criminal's death even for the soldiers who crucified him.