TEXT: Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time, September 29, 2024
September 29, 2024 Father De Celles Homily
26th Sunday Ordinary Time
September 29, 2024
Homily by Fr. John De Celles
St. Raymond of Peñafort Catholic Church
Springfield, VA
Sometimes we’re so busy seeing the differences between ourselves and others
that we fail to see the good things we have in common.
On the other hand, it is important to recognize those differences,
first of all to see the differences that we may want to overcome,
but also, to recognize and protect ourselves
against values that we don’t share.
This tension between recognizing both the good and the bad in others
is a source of particular difficulty for Christians
–we want to see the good in others,
but we don’t want the good that they possess to blind us
so that we fail to notice the goodness that they lack,
much less the evil that they may embrace.
It’s sort of like the apostles in today’s Gospel when they discover that a man,
a stranger who did “not follow” them,
is performing miracles in the name of Jesus.
It seems that the apostles are confused,
wondering if they should do something to stop him.
But even though this stranger lacks the fullness of the good that would come
with being in the intimate company of Christ, Jesus tells the apostles:
“Do not prevent him…For whoever is not against us is for us.”
This need to recognize the good in those who are not fully in our company
leads us to understand the great importance of ecumenism,
or dialogue between Catholics and non-Catholic Christians.
We’re called to look for the things we have in common
and, then, to use those as a starting point for both
mutual cooperation in spreading the Gospel
and in beginning the process of restoring complete unity of all Christians.
We’re not just called to recognize goodness in other Christians,
but also to recognize that goodness in non-Christians.
This is why the Church also stresses the importance of inter-religious dialogue,
which is dialogue with non-Christians, like Jews, Muslims, and Hindus.
We need to remember that even a non-Christian
can come to recognize some of the Truth of Christ,
even if they don’t recognize it as Christ’s,
and to the extent that they pursue the Truth with an open and humble heart.
Yet, as our ecumenism and interreligious dialogue and tolerance increases,
we find ourselves in the dilemma I mentioned earlier.
Sometimes in our rush to see the good in others,
we confuse cooperation and toleration with relativism and indifferentism,
truth with error, and even sometimes good with evil.
The good that is present seems to overshadow or mask that which is lacking.
But it’s important to remember
that just as Jesus insists that we must recognize and respect
the truth that others possess,
He’s even more adamant that we can never compromise
on the fullness of the Truth.
He tells His apostles, “Whoever is not against us is for us,”
but He immediately goes on to warn them:
“Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin,
it would be better for him if a great millstone
were put around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.”
Now, I don’t mean to imply that non-Catholics
should have a millstone tied around their neck.
The point is to consider the intensity with which Jesus insists
we not lead anyone astray from Him in any way.
When Christ refers to “little ones”,
He means not only children, but all of us that He calls to
“become like these little ones” (“like a child”).
So, it’s wrong to lead anyone away from Christ in any way–even ourselves.
____
A couple of weeks ago, during a visit to Singapore,
Pope Francis told a group of young people of different religions,
“[Religions] are like different languages in order to arrive at God,
but God is God for all.”
Then he added,
“If you start to fight, ‘my religion is more important than yours,
mine is true and yours isn’t,’ where will that lead us?
Finally,
“There’s only one God,
and each of us has a language to arrive at God.
Some are Sikh, Muslim, Hindu, Christian,
and they are different paths [to God].”
Of course, this caused a great stir in the press and among Catholics
because those words, at least, seem to contradict Catholic teaching.
Then the Holy Father sort of stirred the pot even more
when, after returning to the Vatican,
he sent a letter to an inter-religious gathering in Paris in which he wrote:
“We need to keep meeting, to weave bonds of fraternity,
and to allow ourselves to be guided by
the divine inspiration present in every faith,
in order to join in ‘imagining peace’ among all peoples.”
First, let me say the pope was speaking informally,
and what he said was clearly not intended
to be a doctrinal or binding statement.
Plus, he was speaking with goodwill to a group
that included lots of non-Christians.
Even so, as the Archbishop Emeritus of Philadelphia, Charles Chaput,
one of the most respected American bishops of the last few decades,
wrote last week:
“Pope Francis has the habit…of saying things
that leave listeners confused
and hoping he meant something other than what he actually said.”
I agree completely with the Good Archbishop.
Even if Pope Francis was just speaking informally,
whenever the Holy Father speaks publicly like this, people listen.
And often, they get confused, as they did with these statements.
So, assuming the best about the Pope’s intentions, let me clarify some things.
To do that, I’d like to refer to a declaration issued in the year 2000
by the incomparable teacher, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger,
on behalf of and with the full authority and approval of
the Great Pope John Paul II.
This document was called “Dominus Iesus,” or “The Lord Jesus,”
and it was written to address some of these issues
in a clear and truly authoritative and binding way.
Let’s look at two statements by Pope Francis:
“[Religions] are like different languages in order to arrive at God,
but God is God for all.”
“There’s only one God, and each of us has a language to arrive at God.
Some are Sikh, Muslim, Hindu, Christian,
and they are different paths [to God].” ….
Now, many folks were confused by the notion that “all” the different religions,
including Muslims and Hindus, are a valid path to the One God.
First of all, not all religions worship one God,
much less the same one God of Christianity.
For example, the Hindu religion has thirty-three principal gods,
and many other gods besides.
And if you look at Buddhism, they don’t have any god.
That aside, are all religions just different paths to the One God?
No, not at all.
As “Dominus Jesus” tells us:
“It is necessary…to reassert the definitive and complete character
of the revelation of Jesus Christ…
It must be firmly believed that, in the mystery of Jesus Christ,
the Incarnate Son of God,
Who is “the way, the truth, and the life” (Jn 14:6),
the full revelation of divine truth is given.
‘No one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son wishes to reveal Him’”
So, Jesus is the complete revelation of God and the way to the Father.
Yes, you might say, but can’t people come to Jesus and His Father
through another religion,
even if that other religious doesn’t call their god by the name “Jesus”?
Well, no.
“Dominus Jesus” goes on to say,
“Belief, in the other religions, is that sum of experience and thought
that constitutes the human treasury of wisdom and religious aspiration,
which man in his search for truth has conceived and acted upon
in his relationship to God and the Absolute.”
In other words, the best other religions can do
is bring together merely human wisdom, not divine wisdom or grace,
in searching for God.
God does not reveal himself through other religions,
except of course in Judaism in the Old Testament.
As “Dominus Jesus” says,
“It is…contrary to the [Catholic] faith
to consider the Church as one way of salvation
alongside those constituted by the other religions,
seen as complementary to the Church or substantially equivalent to her…”
Now, it’s true that people can find some important truths
in the teaching and rituals found in different religions.
“Dominus Jesus” tells us:
“Certainly…some prayers and rituals of the other religions
may assume a role of preparation for the Gospel,
in that they are occasions or pedagogical helps
in which the human heart is prompted to be open to the action of God.
One cannot attribute to these, however, a divine origin
or an ex opere operato salvific efficacy.”
Not all rituals and teachings are helpful. Some are evil.
Again, “Dominus Jesus” says:
“It cannot be overlooked that other rituals,
insofar as they depend on superstitions or other errors,
constitute an obstacle to salvation.”
Think about some of the truly demonic practices of animism, Druidism, or Wicca.
Even think of some of the evil moral teachings of Islam
like husbands treating wives as property
and embracing the adultery of polygamy.
____
Moving on, let’s consider Pope Francis’s next statements:
“If you start to fight, ‘My religion is more important than yours,
mine is true and yours isn’t,’ where will that lead us?”
Again, assuming the best, this is still very confusing.
Don’t Christian Catholics have to say,
“Catholicism is the one and only true and perfect religion”?
Or as Jesus put it, “Repent and believe in the Gospel.”
Catholicism is better than all the others.
Yes, we don’t have beat people over the head with it, or brag about it,
but we can’t think it’s not, or let others think it’s not.
Not because individual Catholics are so great,
but because Jesus is the true God, and He created the Church
and sustains it as His body, the Body of Christ, on earth.
It is a perfect and complete gift from God.
As “Dominus Jesus” says:
“With the coming of the Savior Jesus Christ,
God has willed that the Church founded by Him
be the instrument for the salvation of all humanity…
This…rules out, in a radical way, that mentality of indifferentism characterized by …the belief that
‘one religion is as good as another’…
Objectively speaking, they are in a gravely deficient situation
in comparison with those who, in the Church,
have the fullness of the means of salvation.”
It goes on to conclude:
“Equality, which is a presupposition of inter-religious dialogue,
refers to the equal personal dignity of the parties in dialogue,
not to doctrinal content.”
Finally, let’s consider Pope Francis’s statement saying,
“We need to…allow ourselves to be guided by
the divine inspiration present in every faith…”
Again, assuming the best intentions in the context,
this is a rather infelicitous and very confusing statement
because the words “divine inspiration”
have a particular doctrinal meaning to Catholics.
As “Dominus Jesus” states:
“The hypothesis of the inspired value of the sacred writings
of other religions is also put forward…
The Church’s tradition, however, reserves the designation of inspired texts to the canonical books of the Old and New Testaments,
since these are inspired by the Holy Spirit.”
Again, we should assume and consider the good will of the Holy Father
and that he was just making effort to affably communicate
with people of other religions.
But we need to remember, as “Dominus Jesus” says:
“Inter-religious dialogue…[is] part of [the Church’s] evangelizing mission
…Indeed, the Church, guided by charity and respect for freedom,
must be primarily committed to proclaiming to all people
the truth definitively revealed by the Lord,
and to announcing the necessity of conversion to Jesus Christ
and of adherence to the Church…”
Finally, so that there is no confusion,
let me say that the Church does teach that it is possible
for a non-Catholic, or even a non-Christian, to be saved
—that is, to go to heaven.
As the Second Vatican Council taught us in “Lumen Gentium”:
“Those also can attain to salvation who, through no fault of their own,
do not know the Gospel of Christ or His Church,
yet sincerely seek God and, moved by grace, strive by their deeds
to do His will as it is known to them through the dictates of conscience.”
____
Jesus tells us, “Whoever is not against us is for us.”
But also,
“Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin,
it would be better for him if a great millstone
were put around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.”
It is not a sin to be ignorant.
But it is wrong, a sin, to mislead others by allowing them
to remain in errant or gravely incomplete religions
without sharing the fullness of the Catholic faith with them.
And it would be wrong to mislead ourselves or others to think
that the fullness of revelation residing in the Catholic Church
was in any way unimportant for salvation.
Today, let us pray for the gift to see Christ’s truth
and His goodness in all those around us
as we continue to strive for Christian unity
and for the conversion of the whole world.
Let us also pray that we may always discern clearly
what is for Christ and what is against Him.
And let us pray that we may never, in even the smallest way
–either by our sin, or indifference, or ignorance—
lead anyone, especially ourselves, away
from the fullness of life with Christ and His Catholic Church.