The Eighteenth Sunday after Pentecost

September 30, 2007

Homily for the Anglican Usage Mass

of the

 St. Thomas More Society

celebrated at

St. Anthony of Padua Church, 1013 Wood Street

 Scranton, PA

Luke 16:19-31

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

            Having returned safely from Rome just last night, I want first to give thanks to all of you here who prayed for the members and friends of the Society who were on Pilgrimage.  Please know that even as you were praying for us, we gave thanks for your devotion at altar after altar in the Eternal City, the City of Martyrs.

            The churches and altars we saw in Rome are all indescribably beautiful.  One must really see these churches, go inside them, and pray among the statues and relics of the saints to truly gain an appreciation of the devotion that inspired them.  Some of the churches are more humble than others, and several are downright opulent, but in every case one is struck by the attempt of the architects and artists to communicate the beauty of our Divine Lord through the mediums of stone, wood, paint and glass.  Moreover, these churches are not merely monuments to the faith of those who have gone before us, they also are expressions of the faith of thousands upon thousands of pilgrims today, pilgrims who we saw standing beside us in awe of the same beauty we all hope one day to behold face to face.

            Today’s lessons about the corrupting influence of money and riches upon the human soul naturally cause one to wonder whether the wealth required to build these churches could not have better been spent on the needy.  While we were in Rome, we encountered people who were destitute, nomads who make their living begging from the many tourists they see every day, all day.  Could not the wealth used to build the churches of Rome been used to alleviate their poverty?

            The problem with this question is that it sets up a false dichotomy between our faith as Catholics and expressions of that faith that issue in material edifices.  This false dichotomy fails to recognize that an incarnational faith, a faith that insists that God lived and lives among us, must show forth its attractiveness in physical manifestations of beauty.  We simply cannot say that our faith is beautiful while at the same time we fail to demonstrate its beauty.  The churches we saw in Rome are a testimony to the beauty of the Catholic faith.

            What the Church must guard against is not building beautiful churches but building beautiful churches to the exclusion of other expressions of the beauty of our faith.  Charitable works also are beautiful.  Teaching catechumens and evangelizing are beautiful.  Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs are beautiful, as well.  Offering up the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in a reverent and decent manner is the most important expression of beauty.  Doing all of these beautiful things requires material resources, and all of them must be attended to.  If we use our wealth to attend to all of these elements within our Catholic faith, we will do well and need not be overly concerned that we will one day find ourselves in the position of the rich man in today’s Gospel.

            This is not to say that the Church never has gone astray.  We can recall from our history lessons in school that the Protestant Reformation began at a time when the Church was very focused upon building up physical manifestations of Catholic faith while at the same time large numbers of Catholics went uncatechized, many in the clergy were corrupt, and the evangelization of peoples in the New World hardly had begun even though the Church had known of these people for twenty-five years.

            What happened in the ensuing decades is that the Church got her act together.  As a result of the Council of Trent, the Catholic Church reformed the clergy, recommitted herself to evangelizing peoples who did not know the light of the Gospel, opened seminaries across Christendom to train clergy, and codified the Mass to ensure that it was given the attention due this summit and source of the faith we profess.  Charitable works also became the hallmark of many dioceses across Europe.

            And while all these good things were happening, the Church continued to build the beautiful churches in Rome in which we were so blessed to offer up worship.  The true reform of the Catholic Church took place at the same time Michaelangelo was painting the Sistine Chapel, at the same time St. Charles Borromeo died tending to the sick as Archbishop of Milan, at the same time Bernini was finishing St. Peter’s Basilica. 

            These several expressions of the faith, in other words, are not mutually exclusive, but invariably complementary.  Catholics of that time recognized that the beauty of our faith is not confined to the buildings in which we worship, but neither is it confined to beautiful acts of charity and evangelization.  Both feed the material and spiritual needs of God’s children.  Both must be pursued with the wealth with which God has blessed us.

            What was true for Catholics nearly five hundred years ago is true also for us today.  Even as we seek to evangelize our separated brethren, even as we catechize our children and newcomers to the Faith, even as we offer up daily the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and provide for the needs of unborn children, we must not neglect physical manifestations of the beauty of our faith.

            New vestments and Eucharistic vessels certainly are consistent with the need to show forth that our faith is beautiful.  Do not be ashamed to make such donations.  Do not hesitate for a moment, imaging that the Lord would have you better spend your resources in another way.  Such sacrifices are pleasing to God so long as we never neglect the other Sacrifices we must make in the service of Him who sacrifices Himself for us.

            The truth is that human beings adorn that which we love.  To adorn this house of God, to adorn this altar are manners of adoration.  Wealth is not wasted in this way, spent on ourselves for our personal gratification.  Rather, it is given to God.  Our church, of course, will not ever match the beauty of the churches of Rome, but unless we do our best, we fail in the duty of every Catholic:  to communicate as best we can the beauty of the Divine through the gifts God has bestowed upon us.

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