Imitatio Christi: Homily for the Twenty-fifth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Taking a child, he placed it in their midst,

and putting his arms around it, he said to them,

“Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me;

and whoever receives me,

receives not me but the One who sent me.”

This Sunday I would like to focus on the words “one child such as this.” Too often, this phrase is taken to mean that children are automatically models for emulation, that they are naturally pure. But this is to misunderstand Christian teaching.

St. Augustine, in his Confessions, famously points out that even an infant, leave alone a child, is sinful in its desires. “[I] Myself have seen and known even a baby envious; it could not speak, yet it turned pale and looked bitterly on its foster-brother” (1.7.11). Anyone who has been to school, or is involved in the schooling of children, will also know that children can be little monsters, especially towards those who are weak, or perceived as different.

Our Lord, Himself, in fact, offers examples of childhood, and children, that take away from our romanticisation of children and childhood. Listen to these words from the Gospel according to Luke (7: 31-32)

To what then will I compare the people of this generation, and what are they like? They are

like children sitting in the marketplace and calling to one another,

‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;

    we wailed, and you did not weep.’

Our Lord is clearly disapproving of petulant, childish behaviour, and is demanding something more from us, adults and children both.

So, what does it mean, when Our Lord says:

 “Whoever receives one child such as this in my name…”?

The answer lies in the qualifier “such as this” that immediately follows the reference to the child. This is to say, that it is not simply to children that Our Lord is referring, but to a particular quality that pertains to a child.

To understand what this quality might be, let us return to St. Augustine and his reflections on the sinful nature of infants in his Confessions. Somewhat rounding up his discussion on this point he concludes: “The weakness then of infant limbs, not its will, is its innocence.” While the child may possess, as we all do, a will that has a tendency towards evil, its innocence lies in the weakness of limb that prevents it from realising its will.

Weakness, we should remember is a physical characteristic prized by Christian thinkers. Take, for example, St Paul who in his first letter to the Corinthians (1:27) writes:

God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong.

And in his second letter to the Corinthians (12: 9-10) clarifies this point when he writes that Our Lord said to him:

“My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.

So, this is what Our Lord meant when he placed his arms around that child! We need to be humble, weak like that child, a dependent who placed all its trust in its parents, just as we, must depend on, and place all our trust in, God Our Father.

This reference to the child can go deeper, however, for Our Lord is also saying that to receive that child is to receive Him. So, there must be some more links between the figure of the child and Our Lord.

These links, my dear brothers and sisters, lie in the virtues that Our Lord was the paragon of. The first and second readings offer lists of the various virtues that Our Lord embodied, and we must strive to embody. Gentleness, and patience, compliance or obedience, justice, and the strength to admonish sinners, and finally mercy.

All of these virtues, brothers and sisters are virtues of the strong, because it takes courage to be gentle and patient in an age when might is right.  It is easy to be patient and gentle when everyone around us is being sweet, but it is difficult to be patient and gentle when people are angry and violent. We must be compliant, or obedient. Obedience is particularly a virtue of the strong, because it requires strength of character to acknowledge our error when we are corrected; especially by those charged with teaching us what is right and wrong. It takes courage be just, and above all, it takes courage to admonish sinners and know that they will come for you with everything they have - even if your admonishment is not in words, but through the example of your life. But the good Christian places his trust in the Lord, and rests in the knowledge that we will not be abandoned, as in the words of the psalm today:

Behold, God is my helper;

the Lord sustains my life.

Strangely enough, dear brothers and sisters, this strength comes to those who are weak in the spiritual sense, that is, those who acknowledge that without God, without the Spirit, they are nothing, and that all good, strength, and courage, comes from God.

It will take time for us, dear brothers and sisters, to cultivate these virtues. Until then let us welcome those in whom we can recognise these virtues, above all the virtue of humility, for in doing so, and in allowing them to correct and chastise us, even if only through their actions, we will be welcoming Christ and the One who sent Him.

(A version of the homily was first preached to the faithful at the parish of Our Lady of the Rosary, Fatorda.

Image reference: ‘Vision of St Augustine, detail of the St Barnaba altarpiece, Sandro Botticelli, c.1488, Uffizi Gallery, Florence, via Meister Drucke)

Health for the Body Politic

Some months ago, while reading Moral theology after Humanae Vitae: fundamental issues in moral theory and sexual ethics, my eyes fell on a phrase the author, the famed moral theologian Rev. Vincent Twomey SVD, quoted from St. Paul’s letter to the Ephesians “No one hates his own flesh but nourishes it and cherishes it” (Eph 5:29).

Twomey was addressing the question of gender dysphoria, the situation where people claim to experience distress due to a mismatch between their gender identity— i.e. their personal sense of their own gender—and their sex assigned at birth. Relying on this phrase from St. Paul, Twomey argued that “to hate one’s own flesh is the limit of self-contradiction to which our freedom tends, it is the point at which our assertion of ourselves against nature becomes an attack upon ourselves.”

Now, I do not wish to debate the question of gender dysphoria here, but the quotation from St. Paul stayed with me and has returned to me repeatedly. I realised that there is more that this phrase can offer us, than merely a reflection on gender dysphoria.

For example, the phrase can be used to reflect more broadly about our relationship with society. To the Catholic it is not unusual to see the entire Church as a single body. There have been centuries of teaching on this point, where all Christians are seen as members of Christ’s mystical body. Once again, this teaching can be traced back to St. Paul, this time in his first letter to the Corinthian : “For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ…. Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it” (12:12, 23).

Modern nationalism most certainly took this Christian teaching and made it its own. From my own childhood I recollect little musical performances at school days where students were dressed up as parts of the body, which started out all happy and cooperative, but then went on to refuse this cooperation, resulting in the collapse of the body. Indeed, I believe the Films Division even made a short, animated film on this idea.

Before it was taken by modern nation-states, however, the Catholic Church was teaching that the family is the first natural society, the basic unit of society. If one can argue for secular society in fact operating, and needing to operate as a body, the same thing can most certainly be said of the family unit. Which is why it makes sense for us to assert that one cannot, and must not, hate members of our families, whether natal or those united through marriage, because this is to, whether one recognises it or not, hate one’s own self. Our selves are not isolated, autonomous entities, but twined with those of others, and a happy, self-satisfied life rests on our having loving relationships with those we are intimately related to. To hate one’s parents, siblings, spouses (former or otherwise) or in-laws, is to lay the ground for profound unhappiness. Worse, to inculcate this dislike in own’s offspring is to perpetuate a cycle of hatred which will spin onward into time even as they will not realise where these dark feelings and responses come from.

Having said this, I must hasten to add that pious moralising on your personal lives is not my intention here. I am still building the base for the heart of my argument to come. The argument I seek to make is to suggest that if convivial relationships with those in our family, and larger society, yes, even the nation-state, are critical to our personal well-being, not to mention that of the larger system, then it is critical that we also look further afield to ensure this well-being.

I refer to the way in which early 20^th century nationalists inculcated a spirit of vengeance towards the European powers they were ranged against. To be fair, some of the Indian nationalist leaders, like Gandhi and Nehru, held fraternal feelings towards the British, specifying that their contest was solely against the governmental powers which they sought to liberate India from. Nevertheless, the project of crafting a culture for independent British-India, seems to have rested on systematically getting rid of European influences in our body-politic (the socio-political body).

This project only gained momentum with the emergence of post-colonial theory which provided a veneer of respectability to this project which essentially rested on refusing to recognise that for better or for worse, the European was as much a part of us, as we were (are?) part of the European. The post-colonial project rested on an attempt to tear away these influences, to liberate a precolonial sensibility, or craft a postcolonial culture.

Understandably, this project of cultural decolonization was also turned against others who were seen as colonizers prior to the British – the Mughals and pre-Mughal Turko-Afghan rulers of the subcontinent, and closer home, the Portuguese (who established themselves in the subcontinent well before the Mughals did).

One cannot, however, right a wrong, by committing another wrong, and we can see the error of this, and the truth of St. Paul’s teaching, by looking at the world around us. Almost unawares we have slipped into a horrid world which can be recognised in the famous phrase of Thomas Hobbes, Bellum omnium contra omnes, the war of all against all.

As St. Paul, and his Master before him, taught, Love is the answer. We need to recognise that for good, or for bad, the persons and cultures we demonise are our own flesh. To launch campaigns of hate – no matter how sophisticated or disguised they may be – is to eventually wind up hurting our own flesh. If there is one thing each of us can do at this moment, it is to pause and find a way to nourish and cherish what we have rejected, and the madness that if not checked will only escalate and destroy us all.

(A version of this text was first published in the O Heraldo on 17 Sept 2024

Image reference: 'Study for St. Paul preaching in Athens, Raphael, between 1514 and 1515, Uffizi Gallery, via Wikimedia. )

Behold the handmaid of the Lord: Homily for the Twenty-fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Typically, the 15^th of September, i.e. the day after we celebrate the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross on the 14^th of the same month, is when we commemorate the memory of Our Lady of Sorrows. We do not commemorate it this year because following the reforms after the Vatican Council II we do not allow Sunday, the day when we commemorate the Resurrection of the Lord, to be superseded by other memorials or feasts.

And yet, and yet, when the lectionary of the day is so full of the reference to the Cross, can Our Lady – who shared in the passion of Our Lord, Her Son – be far behind? If one reads the lectionary of the day closely, we realise that we can perceive the figure of Our Lady, patiently standing by Her Son, even beneath the Cross, and offering us a model through which we can deepen our faith and grow closer to Her Son.

The first reading is from the book of Isaiah, and more particularly contains portions of what we call the third song of the suffering servant. The suffering servant that Isaiah prophesies, is of course Christ, the servant who responded to the call of the Master, to save the Father’s people, but is cruelly treated by those He has come to save. Listen:

I gave my back to those who beat me,

my cheeks to those who plucked my beard;

my face I did not shield

from buffets and spitting.

Now this is clearly a reference to the passion of Our Lord, his cruel treatment at the hands of the servants of the High Priest. But immediately before these verses, are verses that can just as easily be understood to be referencing Our Lady:

The Lord GOD opens my ear that I may hear;

and I have not rebelled,

have not turned back.

Our Lady was given special graces by God so that She could eventually be the Mother of God. She was conceived immaculately, that is, without stain of original sin. She was allowed to grow in holiness. In other words, the Lord God opened her ear that she may hear. And when she did hear, the call of the angel Gabriel who announced to Her that she would be the Mother of God, and asked Her consent: She did not rebel, and did not turn back. On the contrary, she responded, with faith in Her God: “I am the handmaid of the Lord. Be it done unto me, according to thy word,” or in Latin: “Ecce Ancilla Domini. Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum”

This Fiat was repeated by Our Lady through the rest of Her life, and Her seven sorrows are evidence of her renewals of Her fiat – at the Prophecy of Simeon (Luke 2:34-35), at the Flight into Egypt (Matthew 2:13-21), at the Loss of Jesus for Three Days (Luke 2:41-50), at the Carrying of the Cross (John 19:17), at the Crucifixion of Our Lord (John19:18-30), when Jesus Taken Down from the Cross (John 19:39-40), and finally when Jesus Laid in the Tomb (John 19:39-42).

What is unique about these fiats, however, is that they were done silently. St Philip Neri would often advise his followers to love to be unknown (amare nesciri). And our Lady was skilled at this virtue and the Gospel today bears (silent) witness to this virtue.

The episode in the Gospel today begins with the phrase “Jesus and his disciples set out.” Now we should know that Our Lady would have been there with the disciples. So when  Our Lord teaches:

that the Son of Man must suffer greatly

and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes,

and be killed, and rise after three days

Our Lady is present in the congregation. She listens, and this news must break Her immaculate heart, but what does She do? She remains silent and she does not rebel, she does not turn back. Rather, She denies Herself, takes up Her cross, and follows Him, Her Son. The protest does not come from the Mother, who has the greatest right over the unmarried son, but from Peter.

In the second reading St. James says:

Demonstrate your faith to me without works,

and I will demonstrate my faith to you from my works.

Our Lady demonstrated Her faith through Her works. Her works were not loud and noisy, but silent and constant, reiterating her fiat through Her entire life; and bear in mind that she consented to be on this earth even after Her son had ascended into heaven.  My dear brothers and sisters, this quiet following of Christ, and the carrying of Our Cross, is in fact the life of many Christians who are the unsung saints of the Church. The wife, or husband, who suffer silently so that their children may benefit from the combined presence of father and mother; the religious who bear injustice, and ingratitude, so that they may continue to serve God and His Church through their vocation; those who work a job that will bring in money, rather than the job they would like to do. The actions of the unsung saint, those who love to be unknown, are actions like those of Our Blessed Mother, who played the side show silently, so that we may be saved. In times of crises, like Our Lord, and indeed like Our Lady, they pray:

The Lord GOD is my help,

therefore I am not disgraced

See, the Lord GOD is my help;

who will prove me wrong?

They say this quietly, because they trust in His promise: that no matter the trials we have to face now, we will walk before the Lord in the land of the living.

Let us, on this Sunday, therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, make our own the words of St Paul, which would very well have been those of Our Lady, even as she stood under the Cross of Her Son:

May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord

through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.

(A version of this homily was first preached to the faithful on 15 September at the parish of Our Lady of the Rosary, Fatorda.

Image reference: 'The Lamentation,' Ludovico Carracci, 1582, The Metropolitan Museum, New York. )