The Perspective of Justice

Giving Birth to Love

“See, I make all things new,” says the One who sat on the throne. The second reading is about a vision of a new earth, a new Jerusalem, in which “there shall be no more death or mourning, crying out or pain, for the former world has passed away.”

The new Jerusalem will be made up of people who love one another. People will not watch in this holy city as their brothers and sisters languish in poverty and hunger, nor will they attack each other in various forms of inhumane treatment, torture, and war. The key to this new world will be love: “This is how all will know you for my disciples: your love for one another.”

The road to this new Jerusalem will not be an easy one: “We must undergo many trials if we are to enter into the reign of God.” We enter the road with faith that the risen Lord will “give us new purpose and bring us to a new life.”

The entire creation has been groaning till now in an act of giving birth, as it waits for the glory of the children of God to be revealed. Let Christians therefore be convinced that they will yet find the fruits of their own nature and effort cleansed of all impurities in the new earth which God is now preparing for them, and in which there will be the kingdom of justice and love, a kingdom which will be fully perfected when the Lord will come himself.

Synod of Bishops, Justice in the World, 1971:75

Gerald Darring

**From Saint Louis University