20th Sunday of Ordinary Time (8/19/2007)

Homilist: Fr. Donald Brick

Brothers and sisters in the Lord, in today's beautiful Gospel Jesus says to us, "I came to cast fire upon the earth; and would that it were already kindled! Pope Benedict XI writes that the fire is Christ’s own passion of love, “a fire that is to be handed on. Whoever comes close to Him must be prepared to be burned. This is a fire that makes things bright and pure and free and grand. Being a Christian, then, is daring to entrust oneself to this burning fire.” The fire is set ablaze when we speak the truth, like the prophet Jeremiah who is punished for it. The message of the Church is there precisely in order to conflict with our behavior, to tear man out of his life of lies and to bring charity and truth. Truth makes demands, and it also burns.” Christ comes to divide us from whatever divides us from him. We must say “Yes” to God! As St Paul says keep our eyes fixed on Christ who is our leader and perfecter in faith.

The fact is that our first parents sinned and began the division. They feared that if God were too great, He would take something away from their life. They thought that they could set God aside to make room for themselves.

This was also the great temptation of the modern age, of the past three or four centuries and currently our century. More and more people have thought and said, “But this God does not give us our freedom; with all his commandments, He restricts the space in our lives. So God has to disappear; we want to be autonomous and independent. Without this God we ourselves would be god and do as we pleased.

This was also the view of the Prodigal Son, who did not realize that he was “free” precisely because he was in his father’s house. He left for distant lands and squandered his estate. In the end, he realized that precisely because he had gone so far away from his father, instead of being free he had become a slave; he understood that only by returning home to his father’s house would he be truly free, in the full beauty of life.

This is how it is in our modern era. Previously, it was thought and believed that by setting God aside and being autonomous, following only our own ideas and inclinations, we would truly be free to do whatever we liked without anyone being able to give us orders.

But when God disappears, men and women do not become greater; indeed, they lose the divine dignity, their faces lose God’s splendor. In the end, they turn out to be merely products of a blind evolution and, as such can be used and abused. This is precisely what the experience of our era has confirmed for us.

Only if God is great is humankind also great. With Mary, we must begin to understand that this is so. We must not drift away from God but make God present; we must ensure that He is great in our lives. Thus, we too will become sons and daughters of God and all the splendor of the divine dignity will then be ours.

It is important that God be great among us, in public and in private life. In public life, it is important that God be present, for example, through the cross on public buildings, and that He be present in our community life, for only if God is present do we have an orientation, a common direction; otherwise, disputes become impossible to settle, for our common dignity is no longer recognized.

Let us make God great in public and in private life. This means making room for God in our lives every day, starting in the morning with prayers, and then dedicating time to God, giving Sundays to God. We do not waste our free time we offer it to God. If God enters into our time, all time becomes greater, roomier and richer.

If our passionate quest of God's cause makes us disliked by people, we cannot say we were not warned by Him what was hated first. "If the world hates you, know you that it has hated me before you. If you had been of the world, the world would love its own: but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you... If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you... That the word may be fulfilled which was written in their law: They hated me without cause."

We will never be popular but we must continue to be zealous for God. Why? Bishop Sheen said: "Because everything that is good diffuses itself. The sun is good, and it diffuses itself in light and heat; the flower is good, and it diffuses itself in perfume; the animal is good, and it diffuses itself in the generation of its kind; man is good, and he diffuses himself in the communication of thought: a Christian is good, and must therefore diffuse his Christianity, throw sparks from the flame of his love, enkindle fires in the inflammable hearts of others, and speak of his Lover because He is Love, for "out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks."

From our mouth we speak the “Yes” of our faith. But what exactly is the essence of this "Yes"? More specifically, how is one to live it out as a member of the laity? In regard to the first question, this "Yes" is quite simply the "Yes" of faith. It is our full, unmitigated acceptance of Jesus as Lord and our commitment to follow him as master and teacher. Indeed, the word "Yes" only makes sense within the context of a dialog between two persons: someone who utters the "Yes" and someone who accepts it. In the case of faith, the person to whom we utter this "Yes" is none other than the Son of God, the Anointed One, the Eternal Word made flesh. Pope Benedict has emphasized the critical need for each of us to encounter Jesus; more importantly, he has shown and continues to show -- both in his words and through his life -- that true fulfillment, joy, and lasting peace can only be found by saying "Yes" to God's plan of salvation as revealed in the person of Jesus Christ. Only in intimate communication with the incarnate Son of God do we discover the grace to "put our faith into action."

Your founder Father Michael McGivney was prophetic -- indeed, well ahead of his time -- in that he clearly understood that this complete and total "Yes" to Christ was in no way exclusive to those who received holy orders or had taken religious vows. On the contrary, it is a "Yes" required of every man and every woman.

Clearly, if lay persons are to "carry out" and "develop" temporal matters according to "Christ's way,"[6] they must first know Christ. They must take seriously Saint Paul's exhortation to have "the mind of Christ."

Just suppose that outside of the necessary structure of the Church, there was only one in all the world who believed in her, who received Communion, acknowledged the primacy of Peter, and assisted at Holy Mass. Just suppose that that one zealous believer the first year converted one unbeliever to Christ and His Church. Suppose that the next year these two each make a convert; then there would be four the second year. And suppose the next year, these four made one apiece next year, then there would be eight converts at the end of the third year.

Now how many would there be, from that one zealous believer, at the end of only thirty years? There would be in the communion lines of the church at the end of the thirtieth year, one billion, seventy-three million, seven hundred and forty-one thousand, eight hundred and twenty four souls on fire with the love of God and communing on the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ.

I want them to understand that it is beautiful to be a Christian! The generally prevailing idea is that Christians have to observe an immense number of commandments, prohibitions, precepts, and other such restrictions, so that Christianity is a heavy and oppressive way of living, and it would therefore be more liberating to live without all these burdens. But I would like to make it clear that to be sustained by this great Love and God's sublime revelation is not a burden, but rather a set of wings -- that it is truly beautiful to be a Christian. It is an experience that gives us room to breathe and move, but most of all, it places us within a community since, as Christians, we are never alone: first of all, there is God, who is always with us; secondly, we are always forming a great community among ourselves: a community of people together on a journey, a community with a project for the future. All of this means that we are empowered to live a life worth living. This is the joy of being a Christian; that it is beautiful and right to believe!"[19]

Indeed, how beautiful it is to believe, for to believe is to say "Yes" to Christ; and to say "Yes" to Christ is to bear witness to our faith in action. My dear Knights of Columbus, may you always remain men firmly committed to this "Yes" -- "Yes" to your families, to your Church, and to your communities -- but most importantly, to Christ who is the "Yes" to all our hopes and desires. God bless you all.