The Ten Commandments were written more than 3,200 years ago. How could a set of proscriptions that old be directly applicable to the men and women of today? How could Jesus Christ have complemented them so fully with his New Covenant?
These are the questions Norbertine Father Alfred McBride, a theology professor at Pope John XXIII National Seminary in Weston, Mass., answers in this engaging volume of stories, reflections, meditations, and teachings.
In each of ten chapters, one dedicated to each commandment, Father McBride presents an illustrative story that makes the chapter’s lesson readily apparent. This is followed by a question and three approaches to the answer from the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The teaching that follows is rich in references to the Catechism and Scripture, and is set in an entertaining narrative that offers historical and present-day examples. Father McBride follows each of these with specific suggestions for action.
Each chapter ends with a meditation and a prayer, both reflective of the challenge of that commandment.
Father McBride begins this course in the Ten Commandments by introducing the reader to the fact that the commandments were issued in the context of a covenant relationship between God and his people.
Therefore they are not simply do’s and don’ts, but rather the expression of a communion between the human and the divine, a blueprint for a deep and enduring relationship. Father McBride tells the reader that God’s purpose in issuing the commandments is to make us more fully human.
“God is the author of human nature, and knows what will contribute to its positive and creative development,” he writes. “Every commandment contains a value that makes us better human beings.”
The message that comes through is a thoroughly Christian one: the more closely we are aligned with the divine, the more fully human we become.
In his treatment of the commandments, Father McBride does not shy away from Catholic teachings that may be hard for today’s culture to hear. In chapter nine, for example, in which he discusses the commandment against “coveting your neighbor’s wife,” Father McBride describes the depraved sexual morality St. Paul found in Corinth in the first century—and draws parallels with our own prevailing culture.
Father McBride explains how St. Paul taught that Jesus Christ sanctified the human body, and that therein lies our key to holiness—and wholeness: purity. “A clean heart makes the difference because,” he writes, “being able to see God and experience a loving union with the divine, the motive for loving another person is never mixed with selfishness or derailed by disordered passions.”
The Ten Commandments being God’s own little instruction manual for our lives, there’s a lot of ground to cover. Father McBride does so by keeping the pace brisk and interesting, the discussions relevant and enlightening. In this book you will find an agenda-free treatment of social justice, environmental stewardship, sexual morality, family values, respecting human life, honesty, peace and war, and the importance of the interior life.
The Ten Commandments is an excellent resource for improving one’s understanding of how the rules God gives us to live by have as their source God’s own deep love for, and knowledge of, us. Read it and answer God’s invitation to enter more deeply into personal relationship with him—and in this way, to become more fully yourself.
Mark Dittman is associate editor of Catholic Exchange. Also a freelance writer, Mark's writing has appeared in the National Catholic Register, Lay Witness, and Catholic Dossier. Mark can be reached at msdittman@catholicexchange.com.
(This review originally appeared in the National Catholic Register.)
