The Cause of Division

Homily

Saturday, August 18, and Sunday, August 19, 2007, 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time, C

Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish, Emmett

Today we will discuss the cause of division. It is important to us, because, if you adhere to your faith, you will appear different from everyone else. And many around you will hate you for it. They will resent your fidelity, hate your obedience, and despise your faith. And count on it, eventually the hypocritical accusation will come, “You’re so divisive.” For it is the way of the wicked to accuse you of their problems. Indeed, arrogant people will call you arrogant to your face. And unrepentant sinners will accuse you of sin. But don’t fear them, for all such accusations are mere hypocrisy.

Among Catholics today, this particular form of hypocrisy often takes the form of “You’re so divisive!” They will say this to you, when you choose your Catholic faith in opposition to the relativism and spiritual malaise of the majority. Did Jesus Christ, the Son of God, worry when others accused him? No, indeed, he says, “Do not think I have come to bring peace, but the sword… division… to set one against another.”[1]

Many great saints and martyrs have suffered and died abominably even at the hands of their own family and neighbors. St. Margaret Clitherow (1556-1586) went to prison for her faith and eventually died as a martyr at thirty years of age, crushed to death, and her husband declared Queen Elizabeth’s supremacy in religion, and joined in the scheme of those who used pillaging churches and monasteries to get rich quick.

St. Elizabeth of Hungary (1207-1231), widow of the admirable King Ludwig, after his death at an unnaturally early age, was put out of the castle with her small children in the dead of winter. They reviled her for her charity to the poor, and now she had to take refuge in a monastery. She died at 24, worn out by maltreatment.

Then I think of the ten great persecutions – and there were other smaller ones – during the first centuries in the Roman Empire. Neighbors killed their neighbor Christians, after having received only good and love from them, blaming them for evils which originated in their own false hearts. Tacitus (c. 55 -117) writes about it in his Annals. He was no Christian, and he even saw Christians as evil criminals, but he was disgusted at the dishonest abuse to which the Christians were submitted, reads as follows.

A huge devastating fire in Rome had been rumored to be caused by a command of the Emperor. “Consequently, to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. … An immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred against mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination, when daylight had expired. Nero offered his gardens for the spectacle.”[2]

Oh, but wait! “The Christians, it’s all their fault. They’re simply so divisive,” wicked men say. “Oh, if only they wouldn’t believe with such fervor. If only they’d be looser in their marriages and chaste lives. If only they’d stop taking so seriously the obligation to attend Mass every Sunday. If only they wouldn’t make us see them practice their faith. If only they would give in, compromise, offer concessions to their faith… then we would treat them as one of us; we would cover them with fame, and money, and every sort of temporal good!”

Yet Jesus comes, promising division and the sword. Now, he wants us to love one another, so why does he preach division so directly and clearly? Why does he set two against three in a single home? The cause of such division is not Jesus; the cause is sin.[3] Sin divides, and pits those hearts against God, who prefer sin to God. And by the way, sin also pits the sinful against the sinful, and there is no love in hell.

It’s popular today to take a position against the Church, against her teaching and discipline. Such positions get people honors, jobs, teaching positions in famous universities, political posts and the voice of the media. Yet God will not be mocked. And so if any of you today find yourselves disagreeing with Church teachings on faith and morals, hating her authentic liturgical practices, resenting her discipline regarding marriage, reviling the celibate priesthood and monastic life, know that you’re on the loosing side. God always triumphs, so be wise in choosing sides.

And so there you are, and you have to make a decision, and you have to make it alone before God in your interior. You are either for Christ the loving eternal Son of God or against him, you can’t be 60% for Christ and 40% for the world who hates him. You must decide to adhere to your faith, in public and private, or to compromise with the world and every evil thing which is in it, all of which is passing away.

To make your decision, take these things into account: God doesn’t compromise, he wants your entire heart, and all your life. You can’t love sin and love God at the same time, that’s impossible. You can’t serve God and yourself at the same time. You can’t serve both God and money.[4] God loves you, money doesn't. So what will your decision be, and why?