Sunday Reading explained?

[on_the_hill]

Can someone explain this reading to me? It was the second reading on Sunday, June 30:

Reading 2 Gal 5:1, 13-18

"Brothers and sisters:
For freedom Christ set us free;
so stand firm and do not submit again to the yoke of slavery.

For you were called for freedom, brothers and sisters.
But do not use this freedom
as an opportunity for the flesh;
rather, serve one another through love.
For the whole law is fulfilled in one statement,
namely, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
But if you go on biting and devouring one another,
beware that you are not consumed by one another.

I say, then: live by the Spirit
and you will certainly not gratify the desire of the flesh.
For the flesh has desires against the Spirit,
and the Spirit against the flesh;
these are opposed to each other,
so that you may not do what you want.
But if you are guided by the Spirit, you are not under the law."

I don’t understand how we’re supposed to follow the law “You shall love your neighbor…” if the last sentence says, 'if you are guided by the Spirit, you are not under the law."

 

[Verbum]

Hi on_the_hill,

When St. Paul speaks of The Law, he is speaking of the obligations that the Jews were submitted to in the Old Testament. Many, especially Jewish converts, held that even Christians had to submit to Jewish law. His point is that ".Love your neighbor."replaces the whole “Law”.

Verbum

 

[on_the_hill]

Thanks.

It is hard to tell which ‘law’ Paul is referring to. The Old Testament law, or the “love your neighbor as yourself,” law. Which, I assume, still stands.

 

[Della]

Perhaps some good commentary would be helpful to you: haydock1859.tripod.com/id197.html.

 

[daisybee]

on_the_hill, I also was struggling to understand this very verse on Sunday! Then I happened to come across the following paragraphs from Christopher West’s Fill These Hearts, which I’ve been reading over the past few weeks. (Thank you, Holy Spirit!) It helped me; perhaps it will help you too.

Says West (his emphases):

The Apostle Paul writes that those who “are led by the Spirit…are not under the law” (Gal 5:18). They’re free from the law–not free to break it (that’s license); they’re free to fulfill it because they don’t desire to break it. Christ didn’t come into the world to shove laws down our throats. He came into the world to align the desires of our hearts with the divine design so we would no longer need the laws.

…] It’s only in as much as our hearts are rebelling against God’s designs that we still “need” his law. To the degree that our hearts are in harmony with divine love, “his commandments are not burdensome” (1 John 5:3).

A key indication of whether we are living by the love of “the Spirit” or by the lusts of “the flesh” is whether we experience God’s law as an aid to our freedom or as a hindrance to it. As John Paul II wrote: “Those who live ‘by the flesh’ experience God’s law as a burden, and indeed as…a restriction of their own freedom. On the other hand, those who are impelled by love…feel an interior urge…not to stop at the minimum demands of the Law, but to live them in their ‘fullness.’ This is a still uncertain and fragile journey as long as we are on earth, but it is one made possible by grace.”

 

[BaltoCatechist]

In his letter to the Galatians St. Paul addresses the question of whether Gentile converts to Christianity were obliged to observe the Jewish ritual law, in particular with regard to circumcision, diet and such. Some preachers had come among the Galatians (who were probably a Celtic ethnicity living in Asia Minor, in any event they were pagans rather than Jews) stirring up the pot by claiming that Gentiles had to observe the Old Testament law in its entirety to be saved. This was “another gospel” that St. Paul warned against (But even if we or an angel from heaven should proclaim to you a gospel contrary to what we proclaimed to you, let that one be accursed! Gal 1:8 NRSV). After asserting his apostolic authority, he counsels the Galatians that they are to observe the great commandment (love of God and neighbor) and are not bound to the ritual minutiae of the Old Testament law. When you see the word “law” in this context, that is usually what he is referring to. This was a big issue in the early Church, and not just among the Galatians.

Do read the whole letter. It isn’t very long, but some of St. Paul’s most famous bits are here, such as there being no Jew or Greek.

Hope this helps.