13th Sunday after Pentecost, September 11, 2011
(Luke 17: 11-19)
Jesus rebukes the ungrateful. To these ten lepers, Jesus gave back their health, their families, their position in the community -- He gave them back their very lives – yet nine out of ten of them didn’t even thank Him. But there is more to this event than just the cure of the ten and rebuking the ungrateful. This event and all events of Christ’s life are filled with meaning.
Today’s Gospel reading records that “He passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee.” Jews and Samaritans did not like each other. He passes through their midst to demonstrate to them, as it were to reconcile them, that the Messiah and the new Covenant He established now make all factions into one.
Next the Gospel describes the ten lepers. We see from the text that they were standing together because they called out together, “Have mercy on us.” And a short time later, the one who returns to thank Him is a Samaritan. Christ says, “There is no one found to give glory to God except this stranger?” This indicates the ten lepers were composed of Jews and Samaritans, who were driven to live together because of their disease. Again this demonstrates that the Son of God, in the New Covenant, has made all people into one new man. The law of the Gospel is that leprosy of the skin is not unclean, rather, it’s the leprosy of our souls that is unclean. The Samaritan returned because he was miraculously cured by Christ – who he now knows to be God. He fell on his face before Him because he was ashamed of all the sins he now remembers he committed. The Son of God tells him, “Arise, go thy way; for thy faith hath made thee whole.” If faith made whole the one who bowed down to give thanks, then it is lack of faith that destroys those who do not give glory to God for the many favors God gives to them.
In the Parable just preceding the cure of the lepers, the Apostles ask our Lord for an increase of faith. He tells them that the way to increase faith is through humility. Immediately afterward, the Apostles see this in action, when the Samaritan returns and falls on his face to give thanks and glory to God for his cure of leprosy.
We have much to give thanks for. We can start with our very existence in God’s universe. Thank Him for our mind that sets us apart from the beasts of the earth, for our sight, hearing, taste, touch, our ability to walk and talk. Thank Him for the Mass and the Sacraments. Thank him for our health. Thank Him for our illnesses and setbacks, which allow us to come closer to Him by offering these up to Him as a gift of love. Thank him for our heart, which, as St. Augustine says, He made restless -- until it rests in Him. We know that antsy feeling inside, that feeling that something’s not right. We feel if only we could put our finger on that one thing that is missing in our lives. We know what that one thing is, and that feeling goes away, when we commit ourselves to obedience to Christ and to His Church.
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I want to give a brief recitation now of what we must know in order to make a good Confession. Absolution is given by a priest to a penitent at the end of a good Confession. Of course, we must confess all of our sins, but St. Charles Borromeo (1538-1584) said that “absolution cannot be given to persons who do not know the principal facts of the faith and the duties of their state of life.”
We have to know the Our Father, Hail Mary and the Creed, which is the statement of our faith. We have to know that the Our Father was written by Jesus, Who is God, that the Hail Mary was written partly by the angel in telling Mary of the Incarnation and partly by the Church. We must know that the Creed was established by the Apostles after Pentecost so when they travelled throughout the world the same mysteries and same religion would be taught to all people.
In the Creed we say I believe in God the Father Almighty, which means He created all things, including our bodies and souls, that the universe did not always exist and that the world will some day be destroyed. We believe that Jesus Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity, became like one of us in all things but sin, that He suffered and died so that we might merit heaven. We believe in the Holy Ghost, the Holy Catholic Church, which means there is one Church, the one that Jesus Christ himself founded, that in His Church He deposited all His graces, and that His Church will endure until the end of the world. When we say I believe in the Communion of Saints we must understand that all Christians take part in one another’s prayers and good works, that the saints in heaven pray to God for us and that we can pray for those who are in purgatory. When we say I believe in forgiveness, we must mean that in Jesus’ Church there are Sacraments which remit all sin.
When we say I believe in the resurrection of the body, that means the same bodies we have now will one day rise again, that our souls will return to our bodies to accompany them to heaven or hell as we have deserved. When we say I believe in life everlasting we mean that the next life will have no end, that our souls will last as long as God Himself, who is without end. When we say from whence He shall come to judge both the living and the dead we mean we believe that Jesus Christ is in heaven, body and soul, and He will return to judge us, to reward the good and punish the bad.
In order to make a good Confession we must also know that the Commandments of God were given to Adam and inscribed in his heart, that afterwards God gave them to Moses inscribed on stone and that Jesus Christ renewed them. We must know the Acts of Faith, Hope and Charity (which is Love) and the meaning of these. Faith enables us to believe all that the Church teaches. We may not comprehend the mysteries of our Faith, but it is Faith that teaches us to believe that God sees us and watches over us. Hope teaches us to do all our actions with the intention of pleasing God, and that our actions will be rewarded throughout eternity. The Love of God consists of our loving God above all created things, and preferring Him above all things, even our own life. This is the love that enables a man to lay down his life for his friends.
We must understand the Incarnation, that the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, Jesus of Nazareth, took a human body through the operation of the Holy Ghost in the womb of the Virgin Mary; that He was like us in all things but sin; that neither He nor his mother Mary suffered the stain of the original sin of Adam which we have inherited. You must also understand the Sacraments, that they were instituted by Jesus Christ and by Him alone; that Baptism wipes out original sin; that the Bishop confers Confirmation which gives us the abundance of graces of the Holy Ghost; that in Penance (Confession) our sins are absolved by the priest; that in Holy Eucharist we receive the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ under the appearance of bread and wine. We must understand that the Sacrament of Extreme Unction helps us to die well and cleanses us of the sins we committed with all of our bodily senses. We must know that Holy Orders confers upon a man the power that Christ gave to his Apostles, and we must know that Matrimony sanctifies the union of husband and wife if they are united according to the laws of the Church.
Knowing all this, you will understand that if it comes out in the Confessional that you do not know and understand all these things, or that you are not truly repentant, the priest may withhold or postpone absolution until he is convinced that you do know and that you are truly sorry for your sins. He must do this by the rules that the Church gives him and if he is not obedient to these rules, it is at the risk of his own soul. I hope you can see from this short discussion that all of Christ’s Sacraments are to be taken seriously, and not lightly, because they all have an effect upon our eternal life. +++
We Celebrate the Tridentine Latin Mass
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