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The Historicity of our Faith, and Protecting our Faith Homily Sunday, May 28, Solemnity of the Ascension at St. Joseph Parish, Detroit, and Sweetest Heart of Mary, Detroit
So there we are, sitting in the pews, and here comes Fr. N. It was the feast of the ascension, and we knew he was going to say what he always said on the feast of the ascension. He said, “It never happened. It’s only a metaphor. The early community simply wanted to express their desire that Jesus, the inspirational man, was with God in heaven. So they wrote in the scriptures a sort of myth or parable, what we now call the ascension.” Do you realize what that means? Have you any idea the import of it, that a priest of the Triune God should preach this to the faithful? It means he has no faith. Imagine, a priest, and no faith! A priest, who spreads the lack of faith! He has no more faith in Jesus, in the Resurrection, in the Ascension, in the Trinity, in the Sacraments, in the Word of God, than you and I might have in the gods Zeus or Juppiter, the myths of the Greeks, or the Nirvana of the New Agers. Maybe you have been victim to this sort of drive-by preaching. Maybe you may have felt the terror of looking at the whole of the Catholic Faith through the prism of Satan’s lie. Maybe you have been tempted to think that it’s all a lie, all a mistake, that it’s not true. If these sorts of demons and devils are tempting your faith, then in the name of God and the Church I proclaim to you: The truth will set you free. Jesus lives, Jesus died, Jesus rose, and he is God! The Catholic Church does not ask the faithful to believe things that would be nice if they were true. The Catholic Church proposes to you the truth, and asks you to believe it. It is a truth ratified by the persons who bore the signs of the truth, miracles, starting with Jesus himself: the dead have been raised, the sick have been healed, sinners have converted, the blind see, and history is full of too many cases of miracles for us to ever count them, real miracles that spring from the Church’s bosom. My message today is simple: Believe the Gospel. I invite you, I implore you, and so I fulfill the command of Jesus at the ascension. There are severe enemies today to the faith. The perverse music which is so important to today’s youth, like a narcotic is important to an addict. Or try these movies that assault the faith one by one, the Da Vinci Code, and then this movie glorifying the Antichrist due this summer [The Omen, 2006]. Think of the media, and how the news reporters once and again misrepresent the Church, lie, accuse and condemn. Think of your friends who look at you with funny faces, because you’re a “Jesus freak.” And all these pressures lead us to abandon the faith. Brothers and sisters, these are tremendous times we are in. Do not fall pray to these many temptations. Jesus is Lord, Jesus lives, he created all things, he formed us in our mothers wombs, he redeemed us on the Cross, and he poured forth his spirit. Protect your spiritual life as if it were the greatest treasure you have: for I assure you, it is. If to get into heaven, we need to pay a fee at the gates, the money of our salvation would be our faith, ripened by suffering. So you, too, go out, and spread to the whole world your faith in the Lord, your faith in the Catholic Church. Be fearless, for the world is passing, and we need to work together to save souls. Go to the whole world, to every person, to the whole person, and teach them our faith, the faith of our creed. |