and drink. It implies self-denial in other ways; and there are a
great many ways in which we can deny ourselves besides eating and
drinking. The tongue, for example, can be restrained in speaking,
as well as in its sense of taste. We can talk a good deal less
than we might without sin, as well as eat less, and yet be none
the worse for it. Then we can restrain our curiosity for news,
both public and private; we can refuse to gratify our sight,
hearing, and other senses--in short, there are plenty of ways for
one who has the will.
{49}
But if we have no will for such voluntary mortification, we can
at least take patiently what we have to suffer from cold,
fatigue, or any pain of body or mind; and not complain of those
grievances which come to us from the neglect or carelessness, or
even from the bad will, of others, and of which it might seem
that we have, in some sense, a right to complain. We may well
consider that we have forfeited our rights by sin, and that
though sometimes we are bound to claim them, yet often it will be
better to give them up. But what are the motives for all this
self-denial? There are many. One is to make up, in some degree,
for having gone beyond what was allowable by now stopping
somewhat short of it; that is, to atone for our sins. But besides
this, it makes us love ourselves less, and God and our neighbor
more; and it makes us a great deal more free really than if we
were all the time having our own way, for it takes away a
thousand cares and anxieties which are all the time distracting
us, and keeping us from attaining the end for which we were
created. Nor can we be happy without self-denial, strange as it
may seem; for we cannot be happy unless we are contented; and the
only way to become contented is to cease to care about the many
things which we are always desiring but often cannot have; and
the only way to do this thoroughly is sometimes to give them up
when we can have them. Besides this, God is pleased and gives us
grace when we deny our selves; for it shows our love for Him.
{50}
And at this time He seems specially to ask these sacrifices from
us. "Now is the acceptable time"; and if we do not make them now,
there is not much chance that we will at any other season of the
year.
Then we must make more prayer now than usual, employing in this
way the time that we cut off from other things. Try to come to
early Mass on week-days; of course, nothing can be better than to
assist at this, the greatest act of Christian worship. Also, come
to Vespers on Sunday, and say the beads at home, in common if
possible, and as many other prayers as there is time for,
especially such as are indulgenced, for these are, of course,
more powerful in satisfying for sin. And in this time of special
trial for the Church and the Holy Father, we will not forget to
pray that the triumph of our Faith, which is sure to come sooner
or later, may be speedy; that the plans of the persecutors of the
Holy See may be utterly defeated; and that they may return as
obedient children to their Mother and ours, the Holy Catholic and
Roman Church.
But, besides these devotions, which we can practise at any time,
there are also others peculiar to this season: those in the
church on Wednesday and Friday nights, which will be the same as
in previous years, and which will, no doubt, be attended as well
as or even better than they have been heretofore.
{51}
There will be a sermon every Wednesday, and the Stations on
Friday. Next to repenting of sin and confessing it, one can
hardly do anything more pleasing to God in the time of Lent than
to assist at the Stations, and help to commemorate His bitter
sufferings and those of His Blessed Mother. "He was wounded for
our iniquities, He was bruised for our sins; the chastisement of
our peace was upon Him, and by His bruises we are healed."
Surely, the least we can do at this season, when the Church
presents His Passion to our minds, is to come and go with Him
over the way of sufferings by which we were redeemed. You will
notice, also, by looking at the table of festivals at the door,
that the Church commemorates, on every Friday during Lent, some
one of the mysteries of the Passion. These mysteries we will do
well to think of specially. Try to come every Wednesday and
Friday, and not miss a single evening from this to Good Friday;
and also persuade others to come who are not here to-night, or
who have not been in the habit of coming; and come not for
amusement, or even principally for instruction, but for the honor
and glory of God and the good of your souls.
{52}
Much hardly needs to be said about alms, the last of the eminent
good works. It is evident enough how pleasing it is to God, and
what a rich reward it secures for us. In the office of next
Sunday the Church reminds us specially of this, saying, in the
words of Holy Scripture, "Break thy bread for the hungry, and
bring the needy and wandering into thy house; then shall thy
light shine forth as the morning, and thy justice shall go before
thy face." And, during the following week, she repeats: "Give
alms to the poor, and it shall pray for thee to the Lord; for as
water quenches fire, so do alms extinguish sin." That is, if we
have repented of our sins, almsgiving will satisfy for them; and
if we have not, almsgiving will help us to have contrition to
repent, and will move God to give us abundant grace; He will be
obliged, as it were, by gratitude, to give it to us; for He has
said, "As long as you did it to one of these My least brethren,
you did it to Me." Almsgiving will not save us without
repentance, but it will help us very much to have repentance;
and, to impress us with its importance, our Lord seems, in His
own description of the last judgment, to make our salvation
depend upon the charitable works which we have done in this life.
And if, by His grace, we have repented of sin and confessed it,
almsgiving will give us a degree of merit and amount of reward
which we may, in one sense, call unjust and excessive, so great
is the mercy of God.
{53}
Fasting, prayer, and alms; self-denial, devotion, and charity;
these are the principal good works at this and every time; but
they are more urgent and necessary now than usual, if we wish to
obtain the special fruit of this holy season. And, besides these,
we must not put away the spirit of humiliation and penance
expressed in receiving the ashes this morning. These are not for
Ash-Wednesday alone, but for the whole of Lent. We must abandon,
in spirit at least, the vain distinctions by which we are trying
to raise ourselves above others, and follow, at a great distance,
the example of our God and Saviour, who, being our Creator and
absolute Master, became the servant of servants for our sake. And
we have an immense number of sins which are not yet fully
expiated; for these we must do penance sometime or other, before
death or after it, in this world or in purgatory. We can do it
better now than at any other time; first, because we are obliged
to do some difficult things, which can be made to pay this
temporal debt if they are done with the right spirit and
intention; and, also, because penance is the spirit of the
season, and we can come to the church oftener, and do of our own
accord other things which are a little inconvenient and put us to
some trouble, without any danger of attracting attention or of
getting proud about it; for others will be doing the same.
{54}
Finally, my brethren, in the words of the Apostle, "We exhort you
that you receive not the grace of God in vain." This may be our
last Lent; it certainly will be for some of us; but, at any rate,
we shall not feel sorry to have spent it as if it were so. God's
love for us is immense; He is continually giving us fresh graces,
which we are trampling under our feet; but there will come a time
when I will not say His patience will be exhausted, but when, in
the course of His providence, we must be taken from this world,
and grace for us will be no more. Then, when we lie on our
death-bed, we shall look back--if, indeed, we are able to
collect our thoughts--upon the gifts of God which we have thrown
away, and wish most earnestly for a day, or even an hour, of the
time that we have wasted. Then, if we have spent this Lent badly,
we shall remember it and the others that we have neglected, and
bitterly repent our neglect when it is too late. Then we shall
fear and tremble at the thought of the awful judgment of God,
before whose face we are so soon to appear; or, if we have
confidence that by His mercy the guilt of our sins has been taken
away, we shall still feel how unfit we are, after a sinful life,
to remain in His sight, and shall see the flames of purgatory
prepared to expiate those offences for which this Lent and the
others we have wasted might have atoned. Perhaps years of
suffering will await us there instead of the few days of penance
which we have refused in this life.
{55}
And, even if we have spent this time well, we shall then see
clearly how we might have spent it better; and every good work
which we could properly have done, which we had the grace and
opportunity for, and yet did not do, will give us more sorrow
than its omission gave relief.
But let us hope better things. There is no reason why this Lent
should not be for us all that God meant it to be. That it may be
so, the first thing to do, and the most agreeable of all, is to
get into the grace and friendship of God, if we are now in sin;
and then we have only to go on and do what we can, not in a
grudging or weary spirit, but cheerfully and with our whole
heart, to please our good God, who loves us each as much as if we
were His only creature, and has done infinitely more for us
already than we can ever do for Him. His Blessed Mother and the
saints, especially St. Joseph, under whose patronage the greater
part of Lent almost always comes, will help us, and we shall have
joy enough in our souls to fully make up for all that is
unpleasant or tiresome. And all the while we shall, by penance,
be shortening the road that lies between us and our true home in
heaven, where our Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier, the Blessed
Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, is waiting to have us come
and be happy with Him for all eternity.
-----------------------
{56}
Sermon IV.
Pretended And Real Christians.
(At Special Lenten Service.)
2 Cor. vi. 1.
"__And we do exhort you
that you receive not the grace of God in vain__."
What is the reason, my dear brethren, that you are all here
to-night? I know very well what it is. There are very few who
have not one and the same reason. You came because you wish, when
you are removed out of this world, to reach the kingdom of
heaven. You came because you would secure yourselves from the
punishments denounced by God against the sinner. You came here
to-night because you feel a strong interest in the salvation of
your souls. It is the grace of God which stirs within your hearts
and impels you to come. Now you are here, I say to you, with St.
Paul, "Let not this grace of God be in vain." It is not enough to
come within the church-walls and hear the voice of the preacher,
unless you arc also willing and anxious to follow out his
instructions.
{57}
I want to tell you what it is to be rightly and truly called a
Christian, and to have a well-grounded hope of salvation. A vast
number of absurd notions are afloat in the minds of many as to
what it is to be a Christian. Where they came from, I cannot
tell. It is not from the Church, for she never has taught them,
and never can teach them. It is not from good sense and right
reason, for they teach exactly the contrary. It must be from the
devil, for he is said, in Scripture, to be a liar and the father
of lies, and these lies are the very ones which are the most
destructive of the soul. One of these lying notions is that
outward communion with the Church of God renders a man a true
Christian, and makes him sure of his salvation. The Pharisees had
this idea. "Are we not children of Abraham?" they said. But what
did St. John the Baptist say? "Say not to yourselves, We have
Abraham for our father; for I say unto you that God is able of
these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. Bring forth,
therefore, fruit worthy of penance." [Footnote 8]
[Footnote 8: St. Matthew iii. 9.]
{58}
And our Saviour said unto them, "If you be the children of
Abraham, do the works of Abraham." If there are any Catholics
foolish enough to build their hopes of salvation on the mere fact
of being Catholics, without having the spirit and the works of
the Catholic religion, let them consider the fearful denunciation
of our Lord against them. Take the parable of the wheat and the
tares. The kingdom of heaven is like to a man who sowed wheat in
his field, and by-and-by, when it came up, a quantity of weeds,
or tares, came up with it. The servants asked their lord, "Shall
we not go out and pull up the tares?" "No," he replied; "lest,
pulling out the tares, ye pull out the wheat with them. Suffer
them to grow together until the harvest, and then the wheat shall
be gathered into my barn, and the tares shall be bound up into
bundles to be burned in the fire." The question is not--Am I
growing in the field of the Church? but--Am I the wheat? or the
tares, fit only for the burning? Our Lord never seems to grow
tired of denouncing this doctrine. Listen to His description of
the last judgment: "And when the master of the house shall be
gone in, and shall shut the door, you shall begin to stand
without, and knock at the door, saying: Lord, open to us; and he
answering, shall say to you: I know not whence you are. Then you
shall begin to say: We have eaten and drunk in thy presence, and
thou hast taught in our streets. And he shall say to you: I know
not whence you are; depart from me, all ye workers of iniquity."
[Footnote 9]
[Footnote 9: St. Luke xiii. 25-27.]
{59}
You see, then, the plea of being familiar in the house of God, of
eating and drinking in His presence, is of no avail. Others, who
are not in the outward Church of God, though in it in heart and
soul, may enter the kingdom of God, but all the wicked in the
Church shall be thrust out.
"There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. When you shall see
Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets in the
kingdom of God, and you shall be cast out. And they shall come
from the east and from the west, and from the north and from the
south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God." It is no doubt
of immense and incalculable benefit to be within the pale of the
Church, and within reach of the Sacraments, but if you presume on
this alone, instead of getting any benefit, you will only make
them the occasion of your damnation. You have received this great
grace, but remember that you are thereby rendered responsible for
the right use of it. "Brethren, beware lest you receive this
grace of God in vain."
Now, there is another false idea of what it is to be a Christian,
and I am convinced that this prevails much more extensively, for,
after all, few are foolish enough to build their hopes of
salvation exclusively in the mere fact of being outward members
of the Church of God.
{60}
This idea is, that, if a man belongs to the Church and does some
good and religious acts, he can indulge himself to some extent in
mortal sin, and still be a Christian and expect heaven. I know
very well there are many sinners who know better. When they sin,
they are aware of what they are about: they know well that they
lose heaven, and that they renounce all pretensions to be true
Christians, and this salutary knowledge drives them back to
repentance and their duty; but are there not some who persuade,
or half persuade, themselves to the contrary? They drink in sin
like water, and make themselves out to be pretty good Christians
notwithstanding. Do they not go to Mass? Do they not appear
occasionally in the tribunal of penance? Do they not cry, Lord,
Lord, and beat their breasts, and call to mind that there is such
a being as God, and that they must do something now and then to
please Him, or else He will get angry with them? And then they go
off and sin as hard as they can, until they come to Mass again,
and beat their breasts once more, and cry out, Lord, Lord, again.
The Chinese do very much the same thing. They set up a huge, ugly
idol in their temples, and now and then go and prostrate
themselves before it, and burn incense, and make some offering.
This is the sum and substance of religion with them, and I fear
it is the idea some Catholics, in their ignorance of their holy
religion and through their evil disposition, have formed to
themselves, too.
{61}
Sin all the week, and try to appease the anger of the Almighty on
the Sunday by some false and hypocritical acts of worship! Why,
they must think God to be something like the idols of the
heathen, instead of being, as He is, the God of in finite power,
and wisdom, and goodness.
What is the story of such people in the confessional? Sin, mortal
sin, is a matter of course with them. Have they undertaken to
deny themselves anything they had a strong desire for, in order
not to commit mortal sin? No indeed! They think it quite excuse
enough that they were tempted. "I could not help it, I was
tempted." "Are you determined not to commit this sin again?" "I
do not know; I will not unless I am tempted." The power of God is
held very cheap by such people. They stand ready to sell it for
little or nothing at any time: for a filthy gratification, for a
drunken debauch, for a dollar or two. Judas sold our Lord for
thirty pieces of silver. They would sell Him for two or three.
Such a person comes to confession after an interval of a year or
so. What is his story? Guilty of frequent absence from Holy Mass
without any excuse--guilty of repeated drunkenness--guilty of
cursing, swearing, and indecent language--guilty of unchaste
conduct. Such has been his life for many years past; and such, it
is to be feared, will be his life until death closes it.
{62}
His purposes of amendment are only on his lips, and not in his
heart. They are made, not to be fulfilled, but to be broken. And
yet such men persuade themselves that this kind of religion is
acceptable to God, and that it is going to bring them to heaven.
Of what value are your prayers it you lead such a life? The
prophet Isaias tells you: "Offer sacrifice no more in vain:
incense is an abomination to me. The new moons, and the Sabbaths,
and the other festivals, I will not abide; your assemblies are
wicked. My soul hateth your new moons, and your solemnities; they
are become troublesome to me: I am weary of bearing them. And
when you stretch forth your hands, I will turn away my eyes from
you; and when you multiply prayer, I will not hear; for your
hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, be clean, take away the
evil of your devices from my eyes; cease to do perversely, learn
to do well." [Footnote 10]
[Footnote 10: Isaias i. 13-17.]
Now, I have placed before your eyes the picture of a false and
hypocritical religion, on the one hand; I will hold up before
you, on the other, the idea of a real, true, genuine
Christianity, which will certainly lead the soul to heaven--the
idea of our Lord Himself in the holy Gospels.
{63}
He invariably represents the true Christian as one thoroughly
converted from the evil of his ways. He compares him to a tree--
"A good tree," He says, "cannot bring forth bad fruit; neither
can a bad tree bring forth good fruit." Why not? Because there is
good sap in the good tree, which goes alike into all the fruit of
the tree, and makes it all of a good quality, whilst the harsh
and sour sap of the bad tree affects all its fruit, and makes it
all bad.
A real Christian has a thoroughly good disposition. He fears God,
and keeps His commandments. This principle of his affects all his
actions. The whole tenor and course of his life is good. He no
longer brings forth evil actions. He may have been bad once, but
he has turned once for all and finally from the evil of his ways,
and has become good. Once he had a bad disposition; he committed
sin, and gratified his unlawful passions, in spite of God and His
commandments, and his fruit or actions were corrupted by his bad
dispositions. They were all worthless for eternal life. But he
turned to God with his whole heart; he was grafted into Christ,
and it is the sap and nourishment of Christ that flows through
his soul, rendering him a new man, and his actions meritorious of
an everlasting reward. To be a Christian is represented also
under this very figure.
{64}
St. Paul says: "But you have not so learned Christ, but you have
been taught in Him to put off, according to the former
conversation, the old man, who is corrupted according to the
desire of error. And be renewed in the spirit of your mind: and
put on the new man, who, according to God, is created in justice,
and holiness of truth." [Footnote 11]
[Footnote 11: Eph. iv. 20-24.]
And then we have a beautiful summary of the practical uprightness
and candor of the thus newly-created man, and of the excellent
fruit of virtue which should proceed from him: "Wherefore putting
away lying, speak ye the truth every one to his neighbor, for we
are members one of another. Be angry, and sin not; let not the
sun go down upon your anger. Give not place to the devil. Let him
that stole, steal no more; but rather let him labor, working with
his hands that which is good. Let no evil speech proceed from
your mouth. ... Let all bitterness and anger, and indignation and
clamor, and blasphemy be put away from you. ... And be ye kind
and merciful and forgiving, even as God has forgiven you in
Christ." [Footnote 12]
[Footnote 12: __Ibid__. iv. 25-32.]
These are, indeed, golden words, which deserve to be read over
time and again, and pondered in our hearts, and embodied, every
one of them, in fervent prayers and ardent desires, arising like
incense out of our hearts to God, that we may have the grace to
realize in ourselves the pattern of the true Christian which they
present to us.
{65}
Let us listen once more to the holy apostle, threatening us if we
fail to conform to this measure and standard of the Christian
life: "The night is past, and the day is at hand; let us
therefore cast off the works of darkness, and put on the armor of
light. Let us walk honestly as in the day; not in rioting and
drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in contention
and envy; but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not
provision for the flesh in its concupiscences." [Footnote 13]
[Footnote 13: Rom. xiii. 12-14.]
Again: "Know ye not that the unjust shall not possess the kingdom
of God? Be not deceived. Neither fornicators, nor adulterers, nor
the effeminate, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor
drunkards, nor railers, nor extortioners, shall possess the
kingdom of God; and such some of you were, but you are washed,
but you are sanctified, but you are justified in the name of our
Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Spirit of our God." [Footnote 14]
[Footnote 14: I Cor, vi. 9-11.]
You see that unless one puts away all these things he has no
right to the hopes of a Christian. A Christian is a follower of
Christ. Do we follow Christ when we go to places of drunkenness
and debauchery? Do we follow Christ when we refuse to forgive our
enemies? Do we follow Christ when we are covetous and hard
hearted?
{66}
Look at the first Christians. They were Jews; but when they heard
the news of the Gospel of Christ, they turned with their whole
hearts to conform to it. They burned their bad books. They quit
their evil ways. They confessed their sins. They were even
willing to sell all their goods, and throw the proceeds into a
common fund, because this religion appeared to them of more value
than all the world besides. They were one in heart and soul. They
were steadfast in prayer, and blameless in their lives. You might
say of them, without hesitation, that they were of such as should
be saved, and their names were written in the Book of Life.