5th Week of Lent 2021 - Wednesday - The Truth will set you Free.

 

“If you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” This has always been one of my favorite lines from the Gospel: as disciples of Jesus we come to know the truth, and the truth will set us.

This is an important teaching for Catholics of the 21st century, for several reasons. First, it’s an affirmation that the truth is knowable. Human beings can genuinely know the truth about reality and morality. This needs to be stressed on account of the widespread relativism in our culture that says there is no truth, only individual opinions and expressions of power, or truth is determined by whoever shouts the loudest or claims to be the biggest victim or has the media on their side.

I think I was first really confronted with relativism in college, when meeting fellow students and professors who made comments like, “well, that’s your truth” or “my truth is just as valid as your truth”. The egotist, often trying to justify his perverted morality, has a very difficult time admitting that truth exists outside of themselves, that the truth isn’t something we make up for ourselves. 

And in 2021, we have been Catholics who have been infected with the mind virus of relativism, who claim that their personal beliefs trump Catholic Church teaching. In these poor souls, one can often sense such bitterness and unhappiness, even rage, when authentic church teaching is presented. They like the Jews in the Gospel today, claim to have God as Father, but reject the Son.

But how these souls would be free, free from that bitterness, unhappiness, and rage, if they would but submit their minds and hearts to Him.

And that’s the second reason why this line from our Lord is so important. It is a reminder that genuine human freedom and happiness depends upon our knowledge of the Truth. Jesus reveals the truth about God and human beings that we may live in freedom and beatitude from error which leads to sin and violence.

As the Second Vatican Council teaches, “Only in the mystery of the incarnate Word does the mystery of man take on light…Jesus, by the revelation of the mystery of the Father and His love, fully reveals man to man himself and makes his supreme calling clear.”

As Jesus embarks on the road of suffering, taking up his cross, we see a man who is truly free, who following the Will of His Father, walks a road of perfect freedom. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, in the first reading foreshadow this holy freedom from fear and suffering. They foreshadow what Jesus perfect reveals: that in God’s will and in God’s truth, we find perfect freedom, even when a cross is on our shoulders…maybe especially when a cross is on our shoulders. 

May the church believe and live out every theological and moral truth that comes from Christ, and taking up our cross to walk with him, may he draw souls to himself through us for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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For an increase in faith for the catechumens and candidates who approach the sacraments of initiation in the coming Paschal Solemnity. And That the Church might be delivered and protected from all spirits of error, heresy, schism, and unbelief. Let us pray to the Lord.

That during this Year of St. Joseph, the Church may discover a deeper devotion to our Universal Patron. That through St. Joseph’s intercession families may be strengthened, priestly and religious vocations may increase, demons may be scattered, and the sick and dying may know the peace of Jesus. Let us pray to the Lord.

For those experiencing any kind of hardship or sorrow, isolation, addiction, or illness: may they experience the healing graces of Christ. Let us pray to the Lord.

For all those who have died, for all the poor souls in purgatory, for those who have fought and died for our country’s freedom, and for [intention below], for whom this Mass is offered.  Let us pray to the Lord. Let us pray to the Lord.

Mercifully hear, O Lord, the prayers of your Church and turn with compassion to the hearts that bow before you, that those you make sharers in your divine mystery may always benefit from your assistance.

Friday - 10th Week of OT 2017 - Salvation from the death that works within us

I read an article recently in the National Catholic Register, by a very good priest, Fr. John Longknecker, a former Evangelical pastor, who was received into the faith, with his family about 20 years ago. He’s a rarity, in that, he is a married Roman Catholic Priest. He was ordained through a special provision which allows for the ordination of previously married non-Catholic clergy who convert and who discern a calling to the priesthood. But that’s not the point of the article.

He wrote an excellent on the current debate in our culture concerning same-sex marriage. He tries to explain why the Church’s position, prohibiting same-sex marriage and same-sex activity is prohibited. He writes, “in the present debate over same-sex marriage Americans simply cannot comprehend that Catholics operate according to a different set of systems. We believe that same-sex activities and same-sex marriage are wrong, not primarily because we think such things are “yucky” and not because we “hate gays” or because we want to tell them they are all going to hell. We believe these things are wrong for clear and articulate reasons.”

Our culture doesn’t understand, and many Catholics who want to accommodate immorality don’t understand, that our teachings on these things are not based on sentimentality, but based on unchangeable, objective moral principles and also on the word of God.


Fr. Longnecker’s reasoning are rightly applied to not just the prohibition on same-sex marriage, but all of the moral teachings of the Church, including the Lord’s prohibition of divorce and adultery, which we heard in the Gospel today.

The world doesn’t understand us because our culture now values sentimentality over right reason, and it expects us to do the same, and will persecute us when we don’t.

But we put our faith not in the changing fancies and sentiments of man, but in the Logos, the Word-made-flesh, who came not to accommodate our sins, but to free us from them, to free us from the “powers of death at work within us” as St. Paul said in our first reading.

Yes the Lord loves us, and he loves lost sheep. But remember he goes out to the lost sheep to free them from the brambles. And the Lord will fight for those sheep who reject him, who keep returning to the poisonous brambles of sin until their last breath. But in the end, there are eternal consequences for rejecting Him and his Truth.

The forces of our sinful disordered nature conspire to keep us from rising with Christ to a life of charity and truth. Through his grace, may we know the strength we need to resist the powers of darkness within us, that we may choose life, for the glory of God and salvation of souls.

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That our bishops and clergy may be zealous in preaching and teaching the truth of the Gospel, and that our future bishop of the diocese of Cleveland may be a man of true faith and the Holy Spirit.

For all of us who struggle with disordered attractions, sinful inclinations, and temptations to serious sin, for the grace to remain faithful to the teachings of Christ, and for mercy for those who fall.

That our young people on summer vacation, may be kept close to the truth and heart of Jesus.

That the love of Christ, the divine physician, may bring healing to the sick and comfort to all the suffering.

For the deceased members of our families, friends, and parish, for the deceased priests and religious of the diocese of Cleveland, for the poor souls in purgatory, and for those who have fought and died for our freedom.

O God, who know that our life in this present age is subject to suffering and need, hear the prayers of those who cry to you and receive the prayers of those who believe in you. Through Christ our Lord.