30th Sunday in Ordinary Time - (Mt 22, 34-40) - If a little child were to ask, "What is God? we should tell him the question is not: What is God?, but rather, Who is God? Jesus is our God, but he was also a person, Jesus of Nazareth. And this Jesus was born in the actual country of Israel twenty centuries ago.

Then, the kid would probably say something about that being a long time ago. And we will say to him that Jesus is still present.  But where? Jesus is present in the Eucharist and in the Bible. If we want to know Him, what he is like, what he did and what he said, all we need to do is read the gospels. If we want to feel closer to him, all we need to do is receive his Body and Blood when we come to Mass. When we want to talk to Him, all we need to do is meditate and pray.

Something different and amazing happens in Christianity. The eternal and powerful God, the creator of all that is seen and unseen, He who was made man in the person of Jesus of Nazareth, is present with us throughout our daily lives. As a result, we Christians do not have to look at heaven if we want to talk to God. We only have to look for Him within us.

We also know that the Lord Jesus of Nazareth suffered, died and rose from the dead for our sins. He died in order that we may have eternal life. We remember each of these truths that I have just recapped for you each time we say the profession of faith, which we will say together shortly in today's mass.

Aside from what we say in the profession of faith, we also know other things about Jesus.  If we sin, we only have to confess in the sacrament of reconciliation in order to receive God's forgiveness from a priest.

God tells us to pray the Our Father.  It is easy to say this prayer, and we should say His prayer often.  In fact, we will say the Our Father today during the mass, but we should also pray it throughout our week.

As you already know, there is no prayer that God does not hear. God listens to us all the time. Even in our worst situations or moments, He can understand us because He knows very well about the difficulties and problems of life on Earth.  Like us, God has lived through many
difficulties and problems since his birth. Nobody offered their home for Mary to give birth in. Jesus was hungry and thirsty. When he proclaimed the truth, he had many problems getting people to listen, and some people even wanted to hit and hurt him. During one time when
he suffered, his friends were sleeping instead of praying with Him. While on the cross, Jesus was naked and suffering, and people around Him were making fun of Him. Jesus is our God, and He knows about human needs, suffering, pain and loneliness because like us, he too was human. Because he shares our humanity, he understands our daily struggles and offers us his love to get through them.

Jesus's love is unique, and he is always sharing his love with us. Jesus makes me feel loved, which I think may be one reason the saints and numerous other holy men and women have been so enthusiastic, strong, and joyful even in the bad moments. They did not lose hope. They understood very well about suffering, and also about God's love throughout all the suffering.

The scripture says, "You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind". This is what we have to do after we understand that God loves us.  He loves us with all his heart, all his soul and all his mind, and we should love him back the same.