Third Sunday After Pentecost

June 1, 2008

Homily for the Anglican Useage Mass

of the

St. Thomas More Society

celebrated at

St. Anthony of Padua Roman Catholic Church , 1013 Wood Street

Scranton, PA

Matthew 7:21-27

            In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.  Amen

            Besides the astrology columns that are downrightly superstitious, the most ridiculous fare in any daily newspaper is the advice column.  You know what I am talking about:  people write to a complete stranger asking her what to do about the most pressing and intimate problems they are facing.  The advice columnist “writes back” in the form of an open letter that the entire world can read.  I wonder:  don’t these people have anyone else to talk to?  Why are the answers always of the leftist, secularist, humanist variety?  And most importantly:  who gave this woman the authority to answer such questions?  Why should we respect her advice?

            The entire enterprise is farcical, and I do not want to take it too seriously, but it does raise the issue of authority.  Advice is just that—advice.  We can take it or leave it, no harm, no foul.  While we look to another as a possible authority, we retain for ourselves the right to listen or not to listen.  We might follow the advice or we might not.  We often assert that we know what is best for us, no matter what this farcical advice columnist or anyone else might say.

            Jesus cautions against this attitude when approaching His words.  While it is true that we should not take an advice columnist’s words very seriously, we must guard against treating Jesus’ words as if they have the same relative weight.  The reality is that the words of Jesus are the words of God, and as He explains in today’s Gospel, we ignore Jesus’ words at our peril.  He quite clearly states that those who follow His words will be able to withstand the tempest when it comes, but that those who do not follow His words are headed for destruction, that the tempest is bound to sweep them away.

            Therefore, when we are experiencing trials in our life, the wise man will not seek advice from friends or family or from complete strangers who happen to pen an advice column in the local paper.  We instead will look to one who truly has authority, whose words are more than simple advice, but are a blueprint for how we are to resist the attacks of the devil.  If we truly are wise, we will talk to a faithful Catholic, either a layman, a deacon, or priest of the Church, one who is committed to teach what the Church teaches.  Moreover, we will commit ourselves to doing what the Word of God indicates we should do in a given situation, lest we attempt to keep final authority in all things to ourselves.

            Such a willingness to assent to another as the final authority requires great humility.  We Americans are used to writing our own ticket, or at least thinking that we can.  However, God’s unchanging truths will not accommodate us if we decide to treat His word as just another piece of advice.  There universally will be consequences to such decisions, either in this life or in the life to come.

            Not only must we accept the authority of another, then, we also must acquire the knowledge we need to meet a particular challenge.  First, we accept the authority of Jesus to teach us.  Then we acquire knowledge about what He teaches.  This is where finding a competent and faithful teacher comes in.  Only the Church has been given authority by God to teach all nations; so we must rely upon the Church to give us the knowledge we need to meet the challenges we will face.

            We recognize that there is a problem, however.  Moses exhorted the Israelites to discuss the law, to keep it before their faces, to hang it on their doorposts that they might know it and do it.  Yet even if they knew it, the Scriptures teach us that they did not do it.  St. Paul reminds us in our epistle today that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.  In our fallen state to know the good is not enough to lead us to do the good.  To know the good and to do the good are not the same thing; so we need help if we are to accomplish the task before us, if we are to be prepared to meet the challenges we are sure to encounter.

            That is, we must do more than accept the Lord’s authority and acquire the knowledge of what is right and true and good.  We also must apply this knowledge.

            What is required to apply the knowledge is the same virtue we need to accept God’s authority to rule our lives.  We need a big dose of humility, for in humility only are we able to accept the help that the Church offers.  And the Church offers help in the form of the sacraments.  By Jesus’ presence among us in the sacraments of the Church we receive the power we need to do what God commands.

            The New Covenant in Jesus Christ is different because it does not involve God on high giving His commands to His lowly people who receive them from afar.  Rather, in the New Covenant, Jesus comes among us and shows us the way to the Father, that by self-sacrifice, by giving away our lives, we may inherit the life to come.

            We see then that we do not have to make ourselves our own authority.  By giving up control, by adopting a humble orientation, we receive the authority that comes only from Jesus Himself.  Just as an athlete must rely upon the expertise of a trainer to win the medal, so must we rely on the authority, the knowledge, and the help of the Church, if we are to inherit the life we desire, life eternal before the throne of Grace.