3RD SUNDAY
AFTER PENTECOST (12th S. Ord. Time)
This Sunday focuses on God's
mercy, the Holy Spirit works to build the kingdom of God even in sinful
souls.
Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather,
be afraid of the one who can destroy both soul and body in Gehenna.
Judith, Chapter 15, Verse 1-2
1 On hearing what had happened, those still
in their tents were horrified. 2 Overcome with fear and dread, no one kept ranks any longer. They scattered in all
directions, and fled along every path, both through the valley and in the hill
country.
Judith even in the midst
of the enemy camp demonstrates her piety and continues to keep Jewish dietary
laws. When offered rich fair she refuses and continues in prayer. Every morning
before dawn she leaves the camp to beseech the Lord. She keeps ritual
purification and bathes in the spring of the camp. Judith for three days establishes
this routine in the camp. She knows she must kill Holofernes before the 5th
day when the rulers of the city promised to surrender. She pushes trust in
Yahweh to its limits. On the 4th day she is invited by Holofernes to
a banquet. She accepts prepares her weapon, her beauty and sallies forth to
battle. The power of her beauty is immediately evident. Holofernes is overcome
with desire. He drinks too much and lies drunk on the bed. All the guests
depart thinking they are getting jiggy with it. They are alone. She prays and
draws Holofernes own sword; asks for strength and strikes: severing his head
from his body. Judith calmly returns to her routine; wraps the head in a food
pouch and goes out of the camp for prayer. She goes home and liberation is
proclaimed. Victory now needs action. Judith acting as general hangs the head
on the city wall and initiates a fake attack on the camp. The cry is heard in
the camp of Holofernes: “A single Hebrew woman has brought disgrace on the
house of King Nebuchadnezzar!” The troops are dismayed. They run back to Syria.[1]
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Building up the Kingdom[2]
Scripture and the Church
teach us that we have three divinely ordained purposes that give our lives
meaning:
·
Salvation — seeking to save our eternal souls
and help save the souls of others (that salvation, the Church teaches, is God's
free gift but requires our cooperation through faith in God, obedience to his
commandments, and repentance of our grave sins).
·
Service — using our God-given talents to build
God's kingdom here on earth.
·
Sanctity — growing in holiness.
The third of these life
goals, sanctity, is central to building Catholic character. At the end of the
Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says something that is stunning: "Be thou made
perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Mt 5:48). St. Gregory put it
this way: "The goal of a virtuous life is to become like God." Scripture
tells us, "God is love" (1 Jn 4:16). If we want to be like God, our
vocation is to love. The essence of love is to sacrifice for the sake of
another, as Jesus did. Love is self-gift. What, then, is our goal if we want to
develop Catholic character in our children and ourselves? Look to the character
of Christ: A life of self-giving.
Natural Virtues
The high goal of
Christ-like character builds on a base of what the Church calls "natural
virtues." Among the natural virtues that families and schools should
nurture are the four advanced by the ancient Greeks, named in Scripture (Wis
8:7), and adopted by the Church as "the cardinal virtues": prudence,
which enables us to judge what we should do; justice, which enables us to
respect the rights of others and give them what they are due; fortitude, which
enables us to do what is right in the face of difficulties; temperance, which
enables us to control our desires and avoid abuse of even legitimate pleasures.
These natural virtues are developed through effort and practice, aided by God's
grace.
In order to develop a Christ-like
character, however, we need more than the natural virtues. We also need the
three supernatural, or "theological," virtues:
Spiritual Virtues
1.
Faith in God, which enables us to believe in God and
the teachings of his church.
2.
Hope in God, which leads us to view eternal life as our
most important goal and to place total trust in God.
3.
Love of God, which enables us to love God above all
things and our neighbor as ourselves for the love of God.
The three theological
virtues are considered supernatural because they come from God and have as
their purpose our participation in God's divine life. As the Catechism (1813)
teaches, the theological virtues are not separate from the natural virtues;
rather, they "are the foundation of Christian moral activity; they animate
it and give it its special character." The Catholic writer Peter Kreeft
points out, "The Christian is prudent, just, courageous, and
self-controlled out of faith in God, hope in God, and love of God." The
supernatural virtues, like the natural virtues, grow stronger through our
effort and practice, in cooperation with God's grace.
“Be sober and
watch.” I. Peter v. 8.
St.
Peter prescribes sobriety and watchfulness as necessary means for resisting the
attacks of the devil, who by day and night goes about seeking whom he may
devour. Woe to those who, by reason of their drunkenness, (The term drunkard
applies to any person who is caught up in the addiction cycle, whether it is
drink, gambling, drugs or sex.) live in a continual night, and lie in the
perpetual sleep of sin! How will it be with them if, suddenly awakened from
this sleep by death, they find themselves standing, burdened with innumerable
and unknown sins, before the judgment-seat of God? For who can number the sins,
committed in and by reason of drunkenness, which the drunkard either accounts
as trifles, easily pardoned, or else, not knowing what he has thought, said,
and done in his fit of intoxication, considers to be no sins at all? Will the
divine Judge, at the last day, thus reckon? Will He
also find no sin in them? Will He let go unpunished the infamous deeds and the
scandals of their drunkenness? He Who demands strict account of every word
spoken in vain, will He make no inquiry of so many shameful, scandalous, and
blasphemous sayings, of so much time wasted, of so much money squandered, of so
many neglects of the divine service, of the education of children, of the
affairs of home, and of innumerable other sins? Will they be able to excuse
themselves before this Judge by saying that they did not know what they were
doing? Or that what they did was for want of reflection, or in jest? Or that
they were not strong, and could not bear much? Will not such excuses rather witness
against them that they are the more worthy of punishment for having taken more
than their strength could bear, thereby depriving themselves of the use of
reason, making themselves like brutes, and, of their own free will, taking on
themselves the responsibility for all the sins of which their drunkenness was
the occasion? What, then, awaits them? What else than the fate of the rich
glutton who, for his gluttony, was buried in hell? (Luke xvi. 22.) Yes, that
shall be the place and the portion of the drunkard! There shall they in vain
sigh for a drop of water. There, for all the pleasures and satisfactions which
they had in the world, as many pains and torments shall now lay hold of them
(Apoc. xviii. 7); there shall they be compelled to drain the cup of God s anger
to the dregs, as they, in life, forced others into drunkenness. This is what
they have to hope for, for St. Paul says expressly that drunkards shall not
possess the kingdom of God (i. Cor. vi. 10). What then remains for them but to
renounce either their intemperance or heaven? But how rare and difficult is the
true conversion of a drunkard! This is the teaching of experience. Will not
such a one, therefore, go to ruin?
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