The Call to Sacrificial Charity
Summary of Headings
- The Apostles' Persecution and Our Call
- The Modern World's Rejection of Christ
- Living the Sacrifice of Christ
- The Mass as the Supreme Act of Love
- Uniting Our Lives with Christ
- The True Battle: Disappearing into Christ
The Apostles' Persecution and Our Call
Both the Epistle and Gospel, I think, are absolutely apropos of the situation we find ourselves in, as the SSPX, and the Church, and Rome, and the world in general. Because our Lord is saying these words on the way from the Last Supper to the Garden of Gethsemane, telling the Apostles exactly what's going to happen to himself, but also telling them what's going to happen to them. That after his death, and his resurrection, and his ascension, he will send the Holy Ghost to them, but that the world is going to be a place of worship, and the world is not going to accept the message that they will bring to the world.
That they will be persecuted, hunted, even killed. That they will be thrown out of the synagogues, they will be chased away. They will be treated as the enemy, just as he was. And this is the fate of each and every one of us. It is the blessing and curse of each one of us, that we are supposed to follow in the footsteps of Christ. Of course it's a blessing, because we get to follow Christ. But the curse is the fact that nobody else, we should expect nobody else to follow along with us, or to be able to accept us. We see it all the time. Family members turning against family members.
We see it in so far as people have disregard and hatred for each other constantly.
The Modern World's Rejection of Christ
We see that there is one great enemy to the modern world, and that is what we offer, what we preach. The famous proclamation, the famous statement made by the revolutionaries of the French Revolution. No liberty for the enemies of liberty has now become no tolerance for the enemies of tolerance. The exact same concept, just with different words. And unfortunately, a large number in the church, have drunk the Kool -Aid of the modern world, of that tolerance, which they abuse the word tolerance, but we won't get into that just yet. And they encourage a sort of peacefulness with the world.
They encourage worldly peace, as opposed to Christ's peace. They encourage everything else. And we are ones who stand up and say, that is not what Christ taught. And as a result, we are the ones who are to be castigated. We are the ones who are to be thrown out of the synagogue. It's not going to change anything about our mission, or our identity, or the fact that we are Catholic, and belong with the Roman Church. It does not change anything of that sort. But the fact of the matter is, this is what we are supposed to be. We are supposed to be like our Lord Jesus Christ,
Living the Sacrifice of Christ
victims on the cross, outcasts, and abandoned by the world. We are supposed to be the ones who are carved out of society. That is who we are supposed to be. Now, we are supposed to do that, of course, in the biggest and most heroic sense. But it starts with the little things. And that's where St. Peter's epistle comes in. But the first thing that we must learn is that our lives are not our own. We have the grace of life. It is a gift. Having life is better than non -existence, of course. And each moment that we are here on earth is a moment of hope for improvement and encouragement.
It is a moment of grace. Each instant that we are here belongs to God. It is a gift from Him to us, that we may serve Him with it. That is why we are here. That is why we exist. Too often we forget that. We're so caught up with all the other things, all the other parts of our lives, that we forget the most simple and most basic part of our life, that we don't belong to ourselves. Our life is not ours to choose what we want to do with it. We have an obligation to follow in the footsteps of our Lord Jesus Christ, now and always, each and every moment of our lives.
Whatever the world says of us, whatever they do to us, whatever the persecution may be, whatever the attacks may be, from whomever it may be, it doesn't change what our apostolate and our mission is. It doesn't change what our obligation is. It doesn't change a thing. We want the world to convert. We want more people to join the church. We want more people to know what the love of God is and His mercy. But the fact of the matter is, we can't control that. What we can control, is what we do with the grace that we receive, with the time that we receive, with the life that we receive.
What are we going to do with all of that? We have to start learning to live the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ, each and every day. Christ came for one purpose, and that was to free us. Each instant of His life here on earth
The Mass as the Supreme Act of Love
was consecrated and dedicated entirely to the will of His Father. And that is how we must live our lives. Now we don't have the beatific vision, and we don't have the divine nature to be able to do that. But we do have the capacity to do that by the grace of the holy sacrifice of the Mass, which is the sacrifice of the cross. We actually have that grace. Our lives belong to God, and the only way we are going to be able to offer them to God is by offering them in union with our Lord Jesus Christ on the altar. So each day when we do our morning prayers, our morning offering, and if we don't do our morning offering, that is one of the first things we need to change.
Let's go back to the morning offering, just offer everything, our prayers, works, sufferings, everything, in union with the holy sacrifice of the Mass. That is the wording that is given for a specific purpose. It all belongs on the altar anyway. The sacrifice of the Mass is the only sacrifice that is actually worthy of God. So our little sacrifices, our little contributions, are minuscule, cannot be compared. Even if we were to sacrifice our lives as martyrs, that sacrifice cannot be compared to the infinite sacrifice of the cross. Which is why we need to unite, intentionally, through our mind, through our intent, through our will, we need to unite every act to, to Christ's sacrifice.
This is the little way of Saint Therese of Lisieux, when she explained that it doesn't matter how big an act is, what matters is how much love we pour into it. How much love of God we give that act, we perform that act. That is the action that saves souls. That is the sacrifice that God wants from us. The sacrifice of the cross, the sacrifice of the Mass, is the supreme act of love. And therefore it is the rallying point for all of the attempted acts of love that we are supposed to give throughout our day. We are supposed to love God above all things. How on earth are we going to learn to do that when we have this wound of mortal sin that we carry, that inclines us to evil, when we have the world that is trying to shut God out, and is trying to make us as soft and weak as possible, to not be able to accept the idea of sacrifice?
Uniting Our Lives with Christ
How can we do that when we even have people in the church encouraging spirituality, which deadens that concept of sacrifice? The answer is always the same. The Mass. Always the Mass. Always the sacrifice of Christ. No matter what. It is the sacrifice of Christ. It is worth fighting for. It is worth dying for. It is worth every little sacrifice we can offer during the day. During the Mass there is a beautiful little moment where we pour the wine into the chalice. The wine represents Christ. And then we bless the water. We don't bless the wine because Christ can't be blessed.
He is blessing itself. But we bless the water because the water represents us. And then we pour in one drop. Or as close to one drop as we can get. That one drop represents the sum total of our lives. Our entire sacrifice of ourselves. Uniting itself to Christ. Disappearing into Christ. That is what we are supposed to give. Everything. And it is supposed to be absolute. It is supposed to be perfect. We are not perfect. But we can learn to love perfectly. By choosing God above all things. By wanting to love Him above all things. By striving to love Him above all things.
And if there is a concrete way to practice this, read the Epistle again. Be prudent and watchful in prayers. That is very important. Prudence. Watchfulness in prayers. There, right there, you have the first ingredient. The first ingredient of what is needed. We need vigilance. We need to be prudent. We need to be careful of ourselves. We cannot trust ourselves. And yes, in prayer. But before all things, have a constant mutual charity among yourselves. Charity has been reduced to the concept of niceness. That is not what charity is. Charity is the love of God. It is the love of the cross.
That is the kind of love that charity is. And that is the kind of love that must inspire us to sacrifice ourselves each and every day. Using hospitality towards one another without murmuring, as every man hath received grace. Ministering the same way to one another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. And then he goes on to whatever we have received, whatever mission we have, we do it for God. And we do it in the name of God. And we do it with the voice of God. Because whether we go out into the world and work, whether we stay at home and take care of a family, whether we go to school and learn, whatever it is that our obligations may be, we have to do it with the voice of God.
We have to do it with the authority of God. And we have to be conquered by God for that to happen. But that means, excuse me, that means that we have to be ready to hear the voice of God and to follow it. We have to see every instant of our lives as an instant of grace, an instant of sacrifice. When we get up in the morning, we don't get up just randomly. We get up because God gave us another day to try to strive for salvation. Another day to give back to Him with interest. Another day to serve Him. So we get on our knees immediately and we say our morning offering.
And then it's important to take a minute to think about all the things we are supposed to do that day. And at that very moment, offer them on the altar with God. To offer them in union with the sacrifice of Christ. I have to eat breakfast at this time. I have to go to the gym at this time. I have to go to work at this time. I have to come back home, have dinner, etc. I'm going to interact with coworkers and family. I'm going to interact with all these people, etc. I have to travel. Whatever it may be. Whatever it is that our lives have to do on that day.
Each and everything belongs to God. And He gives it to us so that we can use it as an opportunity of grace and sacrifice. Difficult and easy. Fun and really not fun. With good people and really unpleasant people. Staying at home or driving in traffic. Whatever it may be. Each and every one of those things belongs to God by right. And God gives them to us so that we can grow in grace. But above all things, have a constant mutual charity. Charity can only be born of sacrifice. If we want to change the world, if we want things to improve in the church, if we want ourselves to be a part of the church, if we want ourselves to be saints, it's going to always start with the sacrificial charity that Christ demonstrated on the cross.
And the only way we are going to learn that charity is by putting ourselves on the altar in union with Christ and disappearing into Him. As that drop of water disappears into the wine to be consecrated into the precious blood of Christ. We must disappear into Christ. Our will must become entirely one with His. Disappearing into Him. As St. John the Baptist said, He must increase, I must decrease. We must disappear in Christ. That is the true battle. That is the true persecution. And that is the one thing the world and the flesh and the devil will always hate more than anything else.
Christ. And the more we become Christ, the more it will hate us and reject us. Which is why the altar needs to be our refuge and our repose. Why we need to live in union with the Holy Sacrifice of Christ so that we may be able to live in union with Christ. So that we may be able to serve Him more perfectly. Give ourselves more completely to Him. Unite ourselves to Him more entirely. So that passing through this Calvary, climbing up this hill of Calvary with the cross, bound to the cross with Christ. We may unite ourselves with Him. Sacrifice ourselves upon it with Him.
And be eternally happy with Him in His glory in Heaven. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost.
The True Battle: Disappearing into Christ
Amen.
Summary
The homily begins by reflecting on the persecution faced by the Apostles and how it mirrors the challenges faced by the Church today. We are called to follow Christ, even when it means being outcasts. The preacher discusses the modern world's rejection of Christ's teachings, emphasizing the need for true peace found in Christ rather than worldly acceptance. The homily concludes with a call to unite our lives with Christ through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, emphasizing sacrificial charity as the path to holiness.