(Epiphany 2014: This homily was given on January 5, 2014
at St. Pius X Church, Westerly, R.I. by Fr. Raymond Suriani. Read Ephesians 3: 2-6; Matthew 2: 1-12.)
[For the audio version of this homily, click here: Epiphany 2014]
A buzzword is defined as “a word
or phrase . . . that is fashionable at a particular time or in a particular
context.”
Every age has its buzzwords. Some modern ones include: “globalization;” “Generation
X;” “millenials;” “viral;” “gravitas;”—and one that you hear all the time these
days: “inclusiveness.”
What brought this to mind was an
editorial from the Times of Trenton newspaper that I came across online the
other day. It was entitled, “Pope
Francis Offers Refreshing Message of Inclusiveness.”
The good news is that this was a
very complimentary editorial--at least it was complimentary toward Francis. The bad news is that it was not so
complimentary toward the popes that came before him. In fact, the editors tried to portray our new
Holy Father as being completely different from his predecessors, and as teaching
things that are actually in direct conflict with the teachings of previous popes. He’s humble; they were not. He’s compassionate; they were not. He’s not materialistic; they were. He’s not concerned with doctrine; they were
obsessed with it. He’s “inclusive”—he accepts
everybody, almost totally ignoring their sins; they divided and excluded people,
because they were almost exclusively focused on people’s sins.
And to support that last point
they wrote the following, quoting Francis himself: “[The Church’s true] message,
says Pope Francis is ‘the saving love of God comes before moral and religious
imperatives.’”
Now I presume the editors of the
Times of Trenton were English majors (or that they at least took an English
course or two in college); however they seem to be completely unaware of the
fact that there’s a very big difference between the word “before” and the
expression “in place of”. Pope Francis
did not say, ‘the saving love of God comes IN PLACE OF moral and religious
imperatives’”—which is what they imply in their editorial. Rather, he said, ‘the saving love of God
comes BEFORE moral and religious imperatives’”—which is, in essence, the very
same thing that Pope Benedict XVI, and Pope John Paul II, and every other good
pope of the past has said!
The teaching, in other words,
that God loves us and has saved us through his Son, Jesus Christ, comes
first. It has a certain priority over
other aspects of the Faith. But that
teaching about the Father’s love and the sacrificial death of Jesus doesn’t negate
or replace the teaching on the commandments!
If anything, it makes the
teaching on the commandments more important!
I mention this today because the
Feast of the Epiphany which we celebrate in the Church this weekend is about
“inclusiveness”—but not the kind of inclusiveness that the editors of the Times
of Trenton advocate. This feast is about
the inclusiveness of God’s plan of
salvation.
The Magi were the first
Gentiles—the first non-Jews—to worship Jesus.
Scripture tells us that they were “from the east”—which probably means that
they were from ancient Persia (an area now known to the world as Iran).
The very fact that St.
Matthew—who was writing primarily for Jewish
converts to Christianity—mentioned these Magi in his gospel was
significant. He wanted to make the point
to his fellow Israelites that Jesus didn’t just come into the world to save the
Jews. He came to save EVERYBODY—Jew and
Gentile alike.
God’s plan to save the human
race, in other words, is characterized by inclusiveness! The best kind of inclusiveness! As St. Paul put it in today’s second reading:
“the Gentiles are now coheirs with the Jews, members of the same body and
sharers of the promise through the preaching of the gospel.”
Everyone is included in the
plan. To that we Gentiles should say,
“Praise God!” But this does not mean that everyone will actually be
saved!
This is the point that often gets
forgotten or ignored.
To be saved we need to follow the
example of the Magi, who, we are told here “prostrated themselves [before Jesus]
and did him homage.”
You prostrate yourself in front
of someone who has authority over you and over your life. You give homage—that is to say, worship—to
God. So by this simple act of prostrating
themselves before Jesus and doing him homage, these Magi were implicitly acknowledging
our Lord’s divinity, and proclaiming their desire and intention to obey him—and
his commandments.
Simply put, the Magi were
included in God’s plan of salvation, and,
just as importantly, they did nothing to exclude themselves from the fulfillment
of that plan in them.
The same, unfortunately, cannot
be said for Herod.
God loved Herod, of course, just like
he loved the Magi; he loved Herod and wanted Herod to be saved—just as he
wanted the Magi to be saved. As one of
the great saints put it in a meditation he wrote:
A tiny child is
born, who is a great king. Wise men are
led to him from afar. They come to adore
one who lies in a manger and yet reigns in heaven and on earth. [But] when they tell of one who is born a king,
Herod is disturbed. To save his kingdom
he resolves to kill him, though if he would have faith in the child, [Herod]
himself would reign in peace in this life and for ever in the life to come. (Second reading from Office of Readings,
December 28)
Herod, as evil as he was, was
included in the plan of God for the salvation of the world, but the Scriptures
indicate that he did almost everything he could possibly do to exclude himself from the fulfillment of
that plan in him.
Like murdering the Holy Innocents.
What the editors of the Times of
Trenton (and many others in the secular media) don’t seem to understand is, yes
God’s salvific plan includes each and every one of us—but it does not include our sins! Which means that if we refuse to repent and
insist on clinging to our sins (as, it seems, Herod insisted on doing in his
life), then we will exclude ourselves
from the fulfillment of the Lord’s plan in us.
Which obviously means we will
exclude ourselves from the glorious and eternal kingdom of heaven.
If the Times editors and others
like them actually took the time to read and study—in context—all that Pope
Francis has said and written, they would see that his message is substantially
the very same message that was given to the world by Benedict XVI and John Paul
II and every good pope that came before them.
They all preach and teach
“inclusiveness”—but not an inclusiveness that denies or ignores sin! Rather, they preach and teach an
inclusiveness that calls people to repentance and to freedom from their sins.
And ultimately to eternal life!
Pope Francis put it simply and beautifully
at the beginning of his recent apostolic exhortation when he wrote this line: “Those
who accept [Jesus’] offer of salvation are set free from sin, sorrow, inner
emptiness and loneliness.”
To which the Magi—and every good
pope of the past—would certainly say, “Amen!”
