How to Behave Like A Christian

We were made in the image and likeness of God. Part of this is the terrible burden of free will, by which we can accept or reject God. Through our free will we can determine our eternal destiny, either in Heaven or in Hell.

But Jesus did not leave us orphans. He gave us the Catholic Church to be our Holy Mother, who teaches us and directs is toward Salvation.

The church that Jesus founded fixed the problem of people not being able to find the narrow road that leads to heaven. Judaism could not find anything that was beyond the law. Only the death and resurrection of Jesus make it possible for man to enter Heaven, and because of this, He left with a Church that could show us how to find that narrow road.

At Pentecost, three thousand people became Catholics. The apostles went on to convert thousands at a time. The Catholic Church continues to do this through its saints. Judaism never did this. Only Jesus made it possible for “myriads and myriads” to be in Heaven with Lamb that was slain, Jesus.

Once again, Deacon Michael personally addresses a member of his beloved congregation of 6:30 crazies during his sermon.

IF YOU LIKE, READ ALONG WHILE YOU LISTEN:

This gospel reading really is one that biblical commentaries have a whole lot of difficulty with. "Jesus did not come to replace the law but to fulfill it." And they’re not going to be replaced until the end of time.

What does that mean?

That brings us back to a concept that is very important, I think. Personally I think it is very important. Every homily I have every given has one goal, one goal alone. It is to find one person in the congregation who thinks about what I said. I don't care if they agree with me. I care about whether they think about it.

And we see this in both of the readings today. We start out with Moses giving the law to the people of Israel. Now, again, the monks in the dungeon of the Vatican, for various theological reasons, have left out a very important sentence that says, "You shall not add or remove any of these commandments."

So you get a structure that has, I don't know, 673, there's a number of commandments that need to be done. The question then becomes: " I'm going down the street of Nazareth at the time of Jesus, how do I know how to act? What do I know?"

Now there are certain things: I shouldn't go up and punch Jeff in the nose, primarily because he'd hit me back; I should be nice to Beth; I should do certain very fundamental things.

But when we get beyond the fundamental things, how am I to act?

And within the intellectual structure of ancient Israel, we have the scribes, and the Pharisees, and the Sadducees, and what do they spend their time doing? Thinking about how you're supposed to act. They're accused of putting burdens on people, but the reality is that they are thinking about how to act.

That tradition continued after the fall of the Temple and the Diaspora. That's what the Talmud is about. There are groups of Jewish scholars who take the commandments and say, "If this situation happens, then what do you do? How does that translate to the modern world?"

We see in the teachings of Jesus something very different. We know we have the two great commandments: love God and loving neighbor. And Jesus is saying, in this reading here, that He has come to fulfill those commandments. So what exactly does that mean? That's open to a whole lot of thinking and a whole lot of discussion.

But if the fulfillment of the commandments came through the person of Jesus, and the coming of Jesus heralded a new world in relationship with God, we have a fulfillment of the Old Testament commandments in Jesus. The commandments of loving God and loving neighbor.

So we see the fulfillment of all the commandments in those two commandments, but they leave us with a very difficult situation: what does that mean? In a specific situation what does that mean?

We, as members of the Catholic faith, have the benefit of the Magisterium. We have two thousand years of very intelligent people thinking about what does that all mean. And, as importantly, when you are dealing with ancient Judaism, modern Conservative Judaism for sure, Orthodox Judaism, and Catholicism, within them is contained a means of structuring of thinking.

We are not placed in a situation where...

You know, that's a bad place to sit Beth. I pick on that place.

... um, Beth is not given a situation where she says, "Okay, I''m supposed to love my neighbor. What does that mean?" And she is not placed in a position of having to go, "I don't know. I don't know. What am I supposed to do?"

She first has the teachings of the Church. And second, one reason I love Thomas Aquinas so much, is that she has, within the Catholic Church an intellectual structure in which she can come to a conclusion which, if it is consistent with the teaching of the Catholic Church, is correct.

The importance of that in our modern world, and this is something that we have to think about because it's the world, well, its a world that some of our younger people will be dealing with for quite a while, is that that intellectual structure has basically disappeared outside of Conservative or Orthodox Judaism and Catholicism, at this point in time.

I was telling Father Franck that I would explain to people that they don't know how to think anymore. That's one of the problems that we have in the United States is you do not find the same intellectual structure within the Protestant churches. And certainly outside of organized religion, you don't find it at all.

Which is why, for the first time in American history, and it has been actually now for forty years, we don't have any Protestants on the Supreme Court. And there is a fundamental reason why they all have Jewish or Catholic educations. They were taught to think. And being taught to think, they were able to articulate and to have a thought process that the powers that be thought should be on the Supreme Court.

In the Protestant historical context, they are not being taught how to think because they are all prophet, king and… there is a third one, I can’t remember what it is right now. [priest] And sola scriptura means you decide what the truth is.

So it is very important, and I will bring it back into the context of Lent because it is part of what we are required to do, is the examination of conscience.

How can you examine your conscience if you do not have the ability to look at what you did and determine if, in fact, it was wrong?

So, incumbent upon us in this period of time of Lent when we are looking upon ourselves, our relationship with God, our relationship our neighbor, how we are living our lives, part of that, by definition, is a requirement that we think about how we have lived our lives: what we have done, what we have thought, what we believe. And we can only accomplish that through the process of thinking. And we come to a successful conclusion of bringing ourselves closer to God by using what God has given us. It's the truth. And using God's gift to us of being able to think. And when you find your way to think, you'll find yourselves, as we already are, within the Catholic Church.

So it's not a situation where you go, "Oh my gosh, I don't know. I have no clue what to do!" The reality is that this great gift that we see of how to understand what it is God wants from us is found withing the Magisterium of the Church, the teachings of the Church. That's why I love the Catechism, it's there, and in the Magisterium with the truth, and in the process and mandate from Jesus, to think, because it is in the thinking process that we will come ever closer to God, and prepare ourselves, and to change ourselves in such a way that we will be welcomed into Heaven when we die.

March 27, 2019 2